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Single Idea 22940

[filed under theme 27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / f. Tenseless (B) series ]

Full Idea

What in the B-universe determines my temporal perspective? I can move around in space at will, but I have no choice over where I am in time. What time I am is something that changes, and again I have no control over that

Gist of Idea

If the B-universe is eternal, why am I trapped in a changing moment of it?

Source

Robin Le Poidevin (Travels in Four Dimensions [2003], 08 'Second')

Book Ref

Le Poidevin,Robin: 'Travels in Four Dimensions' [OUP 2003], p.142


A Reaction

The B-series always has to be asserted from the point of view of eternity (e.g. by Einstein). Yet an omniscient mind would still see each of us trapped in our transient moments, so that is part of eternal reality.


The 12 ideas with the same theme [B-series, of equal times, with no past-present-future]:

Quine holds time to be 'space-like': past objects are as real as spatially remote ones [Quine, by Sider]
The new tenseless theory offers indexical truth-conditions, instead of a reductive analysis [Le Poidevin]
B-theorists say tensed sentences have an unfilled argument-place for a time [Fine,K]
To say that the past causes the present needs them both to be equally real [Le Poidevin]
The B-series doesn't seem to allow change [Le Poidevin]
If the B-universe is eternal, why am I trapped in a changing moment of it? [Le Poidevin]
The B-series involves eternalism, and the reduction of tense [Sider]
The B-theory is adequate, except that it omits to say which time is present [Sider]
The B-series needs a revised view of causes, laws and explanations [Bardon]
The B-series is realist about time, but idealist about its passage [Bardon]
The B-series adds directionality when it accepts 'earlier' and 'later' [Bardon]
The B-series can have a direction, as long as it does not arise from temporal flow [Baron/Miller]