If no time passes while x is F or x is not-F, then how are the different changes between these two states of affairs connected? — aletheist
I think that your views entail that time is discrete, and I have tried to illustrate that with this example. — aletheist
It is about whether reality constitutes a collection of (only) particulars, as you claim. — aletheist
Which basically defines time such that there is a "present," but still does not explain how something can be ongoing as the present tense of "is changing" would indicate. — aletheist
Are you saying that the laws of non-contradiction and excluded middle are only mental abstractions, — aletheist
Certainly other things can happen inside one's head - memories, dreams, hallucinations - which do not seem to be experiences, or are they? — Real Gone Cat
They form a time unit for x, for one. — Terrapin Station
Is discrete time temporally contiguous, with no "gap" in between? — Terrapin Station
Logic and mathematics are languages we've invented for thinking about relations with a high degree of abstraction (abstractions being something that's purely mental). — Terrapin Station
How is that a real connection between the two changes? As you noted, we can only "count" those units from "outside" that hypothetical world. — aletheist
There is also the whole issue of whether x is really still x after each change from F to not-F or vice-versa; — aletheist
because you are saying that each change corresponds to a distinct time, — aletheist
So as an actual thing, apart from our thoughts about it, x can be both F and not-F, and x can be neither F nor not-F? — aletheist
Yeah, in my view it's x and x' (x and x-prime). — Terrapin Station
Where am I saying anything about "distinct" time? — Terrapin Station
At any rate, I'm definitely saying that time is temporally contiguous, with no gap in between. — Terrapin Station
As an actual thing, it's not the same as our logical/mathematical language. — Terrapin Station
If x is F and x' is not-F, is the next step that x is F again or that x'' is F (and so on)? — aletheist
When x changes from F to not-F and when x' changes from not-F to F are distinct times, not the same time, right? — aletheist
You lost me here. Time cannot be contiguous if it is defined simply as change, because it only "exists" in our scenario as the change from F to not-F or vice-versa, not anything in between. — aletheist
As I have suggested elsewhere, it seems that we then have no knowledge of the actual thing, since all of our cognition involves our logical/mathematical language. — aletheist
We could just as well say that it's like a line, say, with time 1 and time 2 as contiguous "points" on the line. — Terrapin Station
I don't at all agree that we can only know universals and saying that all of our cognition involves logical/mathematical language seems especially bonkers to me. — Terrapin Station
Let the record show that you introduced this diagram. Remember, on my view a truly continuous line has potential points exceeding all multitude between any two actual points. This is because two points can only be contiguous if they are (actually) indistinct but (potentially) distinguishable. Even if we marked points corresponding to all of the real numbers - rational and irrational - on a continuous number line, there would still be an inexhaustible supply of potential points in between each of them. Your definition of time as (actual) change thus entails that it cannot be continuous in this way; it must be discrete. — aletheist
Can you give me an example of cognition that does not involve logical/mathematical language, or at least some kind of general representation? — aletheist
All I'm saying is that you could just as well represent time with a line, and different, adjacent times are thus two "points" on the line. That works just as well as saying that it's binary. — Terrapin Station
I just looked at this fake rat I have on top of my computer. — Terrapin Station
You say there can be no such thing as a dimensionless point instant, right? So presumably the present must, for you, either have duration, or be duration itself. If the present has or is duration, then it must be, at least logically, divisible into prior and succeeding parts, no? — John
Only if you concede that there is some distance between the two "adjacent" points. They are not and cannot be contiguous — aletheist
Looking at the fake rat is perception, not cognition. — aletheist
You cannot think about the fake rat (or anything else) without representing it somehow. — aletheist
(I have to ask - why on earth would a team called the Panthers give out fake rats?) — aletheist
The temporal "points" in question ARE contiguous. (And this is like the third or fourth time I've said this.) — Terrapin Station
When I look at the rat on my computer, I'm acquiring knowledge--that it's there, for example; that it looks like it does; that it feels as it does, etc. — Terrapin Station
By the laws of non-contradiction and excluded middle, X is never both Y and not-Y at the same time, and X is always either Y or not-Y at any assignable time. Suppose that X is Y at time T1 and not-Y at time T2; i.e., X changes from Y to not-Y sometime between T1 and T2. There can be no particular instant of time between T1 and T2 when X is changing from Y to not-Y; it is always either one or the other, and never both. Hence if everything is particular, including time, then there is no "present" at which changes "are occurring," just discrete instants before and after each change. — aletheist
If you can think of it as "divisible into parts" and the parts are prior or subsequent to other parts, then the present contains elements which are past and future in relation to one another. How 'wide' is the duration that is the present moment; and what determines its 'width'? — John
the present is one change or set of changes occurring relative to another change or another set of changes. — Terrapin Station
No matter how many times you say it, it will always be incoherent to me. If time is defined strictly as the change from F to not-F or vice-versa, then the points that represent these changes cannot be contiguous, they must be discrete. Time (no pun intended) to call it an impasse, I suspect. — aletheist
"That it's there" is a judgment; "that it looks like it does" is a judgment; — aletheist
So one change to another is necessarily continguous temporally. — Terrapin Station
If that's a judgment in aletheist-speak, I have no idea what "judgment" refers to in aletheist-speak. — Terrapin Station
Okay, I am thinking of contiguous in the sense of melding into one another so as to be indistinct. In that sense, two discrete things cannot be contiguous. — aletheist
Well, in that case, you simply can't have any two contiguous things no matter what. — Terrapin Station
You can in a true continuum, since every part of it is also a true continuum; — aletheist
Then a continuum can't be something with no distinguishable parts. — Terrapin Station
It could only potentially have distinguishable parts. It couldn't have potentially distinguishable parts. — Terrapin Station
A continuum, per the definition you gave, can not have parts. — Terrapin Station
It doesn't potentially have water droplets. — Terrapin Station
By the way, we haven't even started to analyze potential/possible--what those things really refer to ontologically. But that's going to just be another big mess. — Terrapin Station
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