On Wed, Dec 19, 2018 at 4:36 PM Bruce Kellett <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Thu, Dec 20, 2018 at 9:33 AM Jason Resch <[email protected]> wrote: > >> On Wed, Dec 19, 2018 at 4:18 PM Bruce Kellett <[email protected]> >> wrote: >> >>> From: Jason Resch <[email protected]> >>> >>> On Wed, Dec 19, 2018 at 6:00 AM Bruce Kellett <[email protected]> >>> wrote: >>> >>>> >>>> Of course they differ: in one case you have a purely local concept of >>>> the present; in the other case you require some global notion of a >>>> "present", which cannot even be uniquely defined. >>>> >>>> >>> What exists? >>> >>> A: *naive presentism*: only a 3-dimensional space evolving in time >>> (some particular "slice" of spacetime exists, which constantly changes) >>> B: *local-presents*: Events, each in their position in space time, each >>> in their own present time >>> C: *block-time*: Events, each in their position in space time >>> >>> We both agree relativity rules out A. But I struggle to see the >>> difference between B and C (ontologically speaking), unless you are >>> proposing the view that the only thing that exists is a single event (I >>> don't think you are though). >>> >>> >>> There are of the order of 10^80 protons in the visible universe. One >>> does not confuse this fact by imagining that there is only one proton...... >>> >>> I think your problem with the ontology of the strictly local "present" >>> is that you still have in you mind some notion of an absolute, external >>> time, in which all these "presents" exist. Your description of "block time" >>> in C above makes precisely this mistake. >>> >> >> I am only asking what exists in your theory, given you reject the notion >> of the present as a global space-like hyperplane. >> > > The universe exists -- an infinity of present moments. Nothing exists > timelessly because that is incoherent. > > So what defines this the set of present moments? Does it include all events in spacetime? Or only some of them? Jason -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
