Is time a kind of perception of mental beings, or some concrete property of objects and motions in space? — Corvus
Do dogs perceive time? When you throw a ball in the air, the dogs could jump and catch it before it falls on the ground. Surely they notice the motion of the ball. Is the motion noticeable to the dog, because of time? Or time has no relation to the motion, because dogs are not able to perceive time? — Corvus
It sounds illogical to be able to imagine a world independent of mind, when imagining is a function mind.Imagine a world independent of the mind in which time does not pass, our experiences would not be able to perceive the movement of things either, don't you think? — JuanZu
That seems to suggest even motions and movement has nothing to do with time. Motions and movements are result of energy or force applying to mass or object. Time is measurement of the start and end of motion or movement, not motion or movement themselves.I would not say because of time. Time is not the cause of movement, but time is part of movement. For a dog it is obvious that time passes, but it has no concept of time. The important thing here is to understand that movement does not occur without time, because any movement can only be explained in a before and an after. But they are not the same thing: without movement we do not perceive time; but time passes even for a hypothetical motionless object, we call it persistence or duration. — JuanZu
Yes, you are correct here.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
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?The ordered relation: past-present-future refers to the actual, not to the order we choose to contemplate them. — Relativist
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.I’ve never researched the question from the perspective of Buddhism. — 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?Mine is an intuitive understanding but I believe it can be justified philosophically. — Wayfarer
Comrade sounds more spiritualistic. — Corvus
Imagine a world independent of the mind… — JuanZu
Now there’s an oxymoronic phrase! I’m forming the view that ‘the world independent of mind’ is precisely and exactly what the ‘in itself’ refers to. — Wayfarer
We can make things clearer by considering the following example. Let us suppose that two dogmatists are arguing about the nature of our future post-mortem. The Christian dogmatist claims to know (because he has supposedly demonstrated it) that our existence continues after death, and that it consists in the eternal contemplation of a God whose nature is incomprehensible from within the confines of our present existence. Thus, the latter claims to have demonstrated that what is in-itself is a God who, like the Cartesian God, can be shown by our finite reason to be incomprehensible for our finite reason. But the atheist dogmatist claims to know that, on the contrary, our existence is completely abolished by death, which utterly annihilates us.
It is at this stage that the correlationist comes along to disqualify both of their positions by defending a strict theoretical agnosticism. All beliefs strike her as equally legitimate given that theory is incapable of privileging one eventuality over another. For just as I cannot know the in-itself without converting it into a for-me, I cannot know what will happen to me when I am no longer of this world, since knowledge presupposes that one is of the world. Consequently, the agnostic has little difficulty in refuting both of these positions - all she has to do is demonstrate that it is self-contradictory to claim to know what is when one is no longer alive, since knowledge presupposes that one is still of this world. Accordingly, the two dogmatists are proffering realist theses about the in-itself, both of which are vitiated by the inconsistency proper to all realism - that of claiming to think what there is when one is not.
But then another disputant intervenes: the subjective idealist. The latter declares that the position of the agnostic is every bit as inconsistent as those of the two realists. For all three believe that there could be an in-itself radically different from our present state, whether it is a God who is inaccessible to natural reason, or a sheer nothingness. But this is precisely what is unthinkable, for I am no more capable of thinking a transcendent God than the annihilation of everything - more particularly, I cannot think of myself as no longer existing without, through that very thought, contradicting myself. I can only think of myself as existing, and as existing the way I exist; thus, I cannot but exist, and always exist as I exist now. Consequently, my mind, if not my body, is immortal. Death, like every other form of radical transcendence, is annulled by the idealist, in the same way as he annuls every idea of an in-itself that differs from the correlational structure of the subject. Because an in-itself that differs from the for-us is unthinkable, the idealist declares it to be impossible.
The question now is under what conditions the correlationist agnostic can refute not only the theses of the two realists, but also that of the idealist. In order to counter the latter, the agnostic has no choice: she must maintain that my capacity-to-be-wholly-other in death (whether dazzled by God, or annihilated) is just as thinkable as my persisting in my self-identity. The 'reason' for this is that I think myself as devoid of any reason for being and remaining as I am, and it is the thinkability of this unreason - of this facticity - which implies that the other three thesis -those of the two realists and the idealist - are all equally possible. For even if I cannot think of myself, for example, as annihilated, neither can I think of any cause that would rule out this eventuality. The possibility of my not being is thinkable as the counterpart of the absence of any reason for my being, even if I cannot think what it would be not to be. Although realists maintain the possibility of a post-mortem condition that is unthinkable as such (whether as vision of God or as sheer nothingness), the thesis they maintain is itself thinkable - for even if I cannot think the unthinkable, I can think the possibility of the unthinkable by dint of the unreason of the real. Consequently, the agnostic can recuse all three positions as instances of absolutism - all three claim to have identified a necessary reason implying one of the three states described above, whereas no such reason is available.
But now a final disputant enters the debate: the speculative philosopher. She maintains that neither the two dogmatists, nor the idealist have managed to identify the absolute, because the latter is simply the capacity-to-be-other as such, as theorized by the agnostic. The absolute is the possible transition, devoid of reason, of my state towards any other state whatsoever. But this possibility is no longer a 'possibility of ignorance'; viz., a possibility that is merely the result of my inability to know which of the three aforementioned theses is correct - rather, it is the knowledge of the very real possibility of all of these eventualities, as well as of a great many others. How then are we able to claim that this capacity-to-be-other is an absolute - an index of knowledge rather than of ignorance? The answer is that it is the agnostic herself who has convinced us of it. For how does the latter go about refuting the idealist? She does so by maintaining that we can think ourselves as no longer being; in other words, by maintaining that our mortality, our annihilation, and our becoming-wholly-other in God, are all effectively thinkable. But how are these states conceivable as possibilities? On account of the fact that we are able to think - by dint of the absence of any reason for our being - a capacity-to-be-other capable of abolishing us, or of radically transforming us. But if so, then this capacity-to-be-other cannot be conceived as a correlate of our thinking, precisely because it harbours the possibility of our own non-being. In order to think myself as mortal, as the atheist does - and hence as capable of not being - I must think my capacity-not-to-be as an absolute possibility, for if I think this possibility as a correlate of my thinking, if I maintain that the possibility of my not-being only exists as a correlate of my act of thinking the possibility of my not-being, then I can no longer conceive the possibility of my not-being, which is precisely the thesis defended by the idealist. For I think myself as mortal only if I think that my death has no need of my thought of death in order to be actual. If my ceasing to be depended upon my continuing to be so that I could keep thinking myself as not being, then I would continue to agonize indefinitely, without ever actually passing away. In other words, in order to refute subjective idealism, I must grant that my possible annihilation is thinkable as something that is not just the correlate of my thought of this annihilation. Thus, the correlationist's refutation of idealism proceeds by way of an absolutization (which is to say, a de-correlation) of the capacity-to-be-other presupposed in the thought of facticity - this latter is the absolute whose reality is thinkable as that of the in-itself as such in its indifference to thought; an indifference which confers upon it the power to destroy me. — Quentin Meillassoux
We are the victims of an age when men of science are discredited, and only a few remain who are capable of engaging in scientific research. Our philosophers spend all their time in mixing true with false and are interested in nothing but outward show; such little learning as they have they extend on material ends. When they see a man sincere and unremitting in his search for the truth, one who will have nothing to do with falsehood and pretence, they mock and despise him. — Omar Khayyam
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
It is difficult for me to think that time is not something proper to external objects. — JuanZu
remanens capax mutationem ? - I need to go and think about it for a while to see what it actually means. — Corvus
I didn't know Latin and Spanish had the same root. — Corvus
The beginning of culture and of the struggle to pass out of the unbroken immediacy of naive psychical life has always to be made by acquiring knowledge of universal principles and points of view, by striving, in the first instance, to work up simply to the thought of the subject-matter in general, not forgetting at the same time to give reasons for supporting it or refuting it, to apprehend the concrete riches and fullness contained in its various determinate qualities, and to know how to furnish a coherent, orderly account of it and a responsible judgment upon it. This beginning of mental cultivation will, however, very soon make way for the earnestness of actual life in all its fullness, which leads to a living experience of the subject-matter itself; and when, in addition, conceptual thought strenuously penetrates to the very depths of its meaning, such knowledge and style of judgment will keep their due place in everyday thought and conversation. — Hegel
English, on the other hand, has nothing to do with Latin. It's more similar to German. — Arcane Sandwich
That's not really true. English is technically Germanic, as being rooted that way historically, but the Latin influence over time is so significant that it's false to say that English has nothing to do with Latin. — Metaphysician Undercover
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
I have missed this post. Apologies. Belated welcome to the thread.Now that I've joined this thread, I will say something about this statement, namely, that I think it's fallacious. — 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.But this emphatically doesn't mean that 'time doesn't exist', simpliciter. Try holding your breath for a minute while you say that. — Wayfarer
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.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? — Corvus
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. — Corvus
In After Finitude, for instance, Meillassoux argues that phenomenology because of its commitment to correlationism is unable to accept the literal truth of scientific statements concerning events happening prior to the emergence of consciousness. When faced with a statement like “The accretion of the Earth happened 4.56 billion years ago”, phenomenology is forced to adopt a two-layered approach. It has to insist on the difference between the immediate, realist, meaning of the statement, and a more profound, transcendental, interpretation of it. It can accept the truth of the statement, but only by adding the codicil that it is true “for us”. Meillassoux finds this move unacceptable and claims that it is dangerously close to the position of creationists (Meillassoux 2008, 18, cf. Brassier 2007, 62). He insists that fidelity to science demands that we take scientific statements at face value and that we reject correlationism. No compromise is possible. Either scientific statements have a literal realist sense and only a realist sense or they have no sense at all (Meillassoux 2008: 17).
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
Again, time itself doesn't become anything. We see them different way. There are no labels on time.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
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
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