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Full Idea
Rather than treating presentness as an acquired property …. presentism equates the metaphysical specialness of the present with existence.
Gist of Idea
The present moment is a matter of existence, not of acquiring a property
Source
Baron,S/Miller,K (Intro to the Philosophy of Time [2019], 2.2)
Book Ref
Baron,S/Miller,K: 'Introduction to the Philosophy of Time' [Polity 2019], p.40
A Reaction
It seems like common sense to say that the recent scratching of my chin came into existence and then went out of existence (rather than that it acquired and then lost a property).
Related Idea
Idea 22996 The A-series has to treat being past, present or future as properties [Baron/Miller]
22957 | We can't tell whether the changing present moment is one thing, or a succession of things [Aristotle] |
22966 | The present moment is a link (of past to future), and also a limit (of past and of future) [Aristotle] |
20818 | The present does not exist, so our immediate experience is actually part past and part future [Chrysippus, by Plutarch] |
20821 | Time is continous and infinitely divisible, so there cannot be a wholly present time [Chrysippus, by Stobaeus] |
22742 | Socrates either dies when he exists (before his death) or when he doesn't (after his death) [Sext.Empiricus] |
22751 | If the present is just the limit of the past or the future, it can't exist because they don't exist [Sext.Empiricus] |
22891 | We could be aware of time if senses briefly vibrated, extending their experience of movement [Russell, by Bardon] |
17552 | In relativity the length of the 'present moment' is relative to distance from the observer [Heisenberg] |
24222 | If we ignore all our thoughts of the past and the future, there is nothing left of the present [Weil] |
18401 | The pure present moment is too brief to be experienced [Armstrong] |
12690 | The present is the collapse of the light wavefront from the Big Bang [Ellis] |
22942 | If time is infinitely divisible, then the present must be infinitely short [Le Poidevin] |
22990 | The moving spotlight says entities can have properties of being present, past or future [Baron/Miller] |
22997 | The present moment is a matter of existence, not of acquiring a property [Baron/Miller] |