Philosophy of Time

A Contemporary Introduction

Sean Enda Power

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781315283593
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Philosophy History & Theory

As a growing area of research, the philosophy of time is increasingly relevant to different areas of philosophy and even other disciplines. This book describes and evaluates the most important debates in philosophy of time, under several subject areas: metaphysics, epistemology, physics, philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, cognitive science, rationality, and art.

Questions this book investigates include the following. Can we know what time really is? Is time possible, especially given modern physics? Must there be time because we cannot think without it? What do we experience of time? How might philosophy of time be relevant to understanding the mind–body relationship or evidence in cognitive science? Can the philosophy of time help us understand biases toward the future and the fear of death? How is time relevant to art—and is art relevant to philosophical debates about time? Finally, what exactly could time travel be? And could time travel satisfy emotions such as nostalgia and regret?

Through asking such questions, and showing how they might be best answered, the book demonstrates the importance philosophy of time has in contemporary thought. Each of the book's ten chapters begins with a helpful introduction and ends with study questions and an annotated list of further reading. This and a comprehensive bibliography at the end of the book prepare the reader to go further in their study of the philosophy of time.

1Epistemology of Time

Overview

Introduction

Folk Time

Independent Time

Scepticism about Time

Knowledge of Time through Perception

Study Questions

Suggested Readings

Overview

Is there anything particularly challenging about our knowledge of time? In our everyday discourse, we commonly make claims about time: we say what time it is, or describe temporal properties of things, such as objects ceasing to exist, one thing happening after another, or processes taking a long time. Indeed, we need to know about such time, for time seems a central property to the objects and events of the everyday living world. In folk discourse about the world, time is as common and self-evident as other properties of things, such as shape and colour.

However, there are arguments against knowing about time itself. Aristotle argues that time independent of other things is not something we can be aware of or justify any knowledge of it. Kant argues that specific properties we attribute to such independent time—being infinite and having a beginning—are incompatible; yet, we have equally compelling reasons to hold time has both. This contradiction in our idea of time shows it cannot be something real, but only something in our mind.

Indeed, the sceptic Sextus Empiricus claims that, when we even consider temporal properties of things, we cannot claim to know what they are; we must be sceptical about them: they may, for example, belong to objects in the world (as we often describe them as); however, they may also not belong to such things. We cannot decide which it is, and so are forced to suspend such beliefs about time.

Furthermore, there is a particular challenge to how we can know about particular instances of temporal properties, the temporal order of events in the world. A common model of knowledge of particular things in the world is the causal truth-maker theory of knowledge (CTMP). This theory does not fit knowledge of temporal order. Le Poidevin proposes a modification of the theory to accommodate it.

These epistemological problems for time show it raises particular challenges. The way out of them is to go deeper into the philosophy of time, and to areas explored in other philosophical approaches (such as metaphysics).

Introduction

Every day, everyone uses and discusses time. We refer to what time it is and answer by looking at our clocks. We observe and discuss change, temporal order, and the length of time (that is, duration). We think about the past, present, and future. So, surely we know what time is? Otherwise, what are we all talking about? And, what is the time that we do not know about, if it is not this everyday thing?

Knowing about time is not like knowing about evolution, quarks, the Gnostic heresy, or Gödel’s incompleteness theory. A typical person, untrained in science, religion, or mathematics probably knows little or nothing about these three topics. They might know something, such as how they are represented in fiction, popular science, or conspiracy theories; they might, as a result, be interested in them and have opinions about them. But the subject matter of these theories does not play any obvious role in how a typical person goes about their life. For ordinary, non-expert folk, these topics are not part of how we think about or act toward ourselves, each other, and the rest of the world.

Not so with time. Time is part of how everyone thinks about the world and relates to it. It is also part of how we understand and relate to each other. It is there in the most common human activities, such as boiling water or rushing to work; in the least interesting, such as sorting through email spam; in the most significant and profound, such as birth and grief.

As such, it might seem that knowing about time is important to everyone. Furthermore, since time is part of how everyone thinks about the world, everyone knows about time.

Yet, theorists—for example, philosophers and physicists—have often argued for counter-intuitive ideas of time. Some have argued that time is unreal (as we discuss in the first metaphysics chapter). Others argue that we cannot know about time itself. Yet others hold that our beliefs about time are contradictory. Others, again, argue that time—though it may exist—is really nothing like time as we think or encounter. There is time—but ordinary people do not know time.

Yet how can we not know about time? Again, it is not some rare or hidden thing. Time is obvious in everything we do. We are aware of it when boiling an egg or going to work. So, what can these theorists be talking about?

Perhaps they are talking about something else. In some subjects, theorists use a term common in everyday discourse and which refers to a familiar feature of the world. However, they mean something else entirely. For example, quantum chromodynamics is the study of fundamental particles; particle values or charges are labelled as “red”, “green”, and “blue”. Yet, whatever these “colours” might be, they are nothing like the colours we see. The “colours” have a more technical meaning, one which a non-expert (such as this author) can only struggle to understand.

Some physicists might dispute the claims of chromodynamicists. For example, they might argue that quarks in fact do not have colours (I have no idea if that makes sense). This is no problem for our everyday knowledge of colour through seeing things. If a physicist claims that folk cannot know about quarks’ colours, it does not mean we do not know about colours as we understand them. We are each talking about a different thing.

Theoretical Time Is Not Folk Time

So, perhaps it is the same with theories about time. We do not know about the philosopher or physicist’s concept of time because it is not time as we use it every day. “Time” in physics or metaphysics does not, for example, include the period of time—the duration—it takes for an egg to boil; the theorist’s time does not include the change in a ripening apple. The temporal order of events in physical time is not the same temporal order found between an apple hanging from a branch, the apple falling, and it rolling to the side of a stream.

It is something else entirely. Just as there is no connection between a red quark and a red fire engine, there is no connection between temporal order in physical time and temporal order in everyday life.

This is how Bergson responds to theorists who make such puzzling claims about time. Bergson argued against the modern physical concept of time, in particular relative simultaneity. He added:

What ought you to do? […] if you felt sorry for the poor philosopher condemned to tete-a-tete with reality, acquainted with it alone (rather than physical theory)? You would give another name to learned simultaneity, at least when you talk philosophy.

(Bergson 1999, 46)

Bergson pushes back as a philosopher against physicists’ counter-intuitive claims about time. However, as evident from his more general attack on the physicists’ concept of time (discussed in Chapter 4), his claim is on behalf of how time is lived. It is based on how we experience time and use it in everyday life.

We examine Bergson’s arguments in more detail in other chapters. For now, this approach cannot work for theorists about time. What they discuss is also purported to include time as we encounter it. As we see in other chapters, no theoretical discussions on time first define what is meant by “time” as something that is not actually time. An example of the temporal order in physical theory is the order found in an apple falling from a tree. The duration in metaphysics includes that of the boiling egg. This is why Bergson’s statement is an objection to physicists’ views on time. They intend to talk about time—but, he says, they ought not to.

So, it appears that we know something about the time discussed in physics and philosophy in everyday life. They are not different things, not like quark red is different to fire engine red.

Yet, again, some theorists do argue that we cannot know about time. Given how we think about time, it is not possible to know there is such time. Another argument is more technical, but also illustrates why even the most basic of temporal features that we take for granted can be problematic.

When they make this argument, they do not mean something else and merely refer to it as time. So, we have a puzzle. We seem to know about time but, given how we think about time, we cannot know about it.

Perhaps it is this: the folk just are significantly mistaken about time. In response to Bergson, Einstein stated that there is no time as understood by philosophers (Bergson 1999; for discussion, Canales 2016). Given what Bergson purported to be defending, Bergson and those who agree with him would take Einstein to be stating that there is no time as ordinarily understood.

There is a precedent for such an approach. Time might be like how some colour theorists think about colour. This is not the colour of quantum physics but that of everyday life. Anti-realists or non-physicalists about colour think the folk view of colour is mistaken. From seeing objects, folks think that colour is a property of physical objects. It is possessed by things in the external world separate from us. However, many colour theorists argue that colour is not possessed by external things at all. It is a result of processes within the observer (for discussion, Arstila 2005).

Similarly, the nature of time, how time is really or in fact, could be significantly different to how we normally think it to be. For example, we might think that time is part of the external world; however, we might find on further investigation that time is not.

A World Without Time Is Not a World We Understand

This analogy may be correct. One may be as anti-realist about time as one is about colour. However, moving time into the mind and removing it from the external world, or denying its existence entirely, raises much deeper problems than doing the same for colour. This is discussed in more detail in other chapters (Chapters 4 and 6), but a brief note here is enough to illustrate what is at stake.

If time is not in the world, then the world lacks almos...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Information
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of Figures
• Preface
• About This Book
• Acknowledgements
• 1 Epistemology of Time
• 2 Metaphysics of Time I: Time and Change
• 3 Metaphysics of Time II: Change and Persistence in Objects
• 4 Philosophy of Physics and Time
• 5 Philosophy of Language and Time
• 6 Philosophy of Mind and Time
• 7 Philosophy of Cognitive Science and Time
• 8 Rationality of Time
• 9 Philosophy of Art and Time
• 10 Philosophy of Time Travel
• Bibliography
• Index