more on this theme | more from this thinker
Full Idea
If region A has a year's 'freeze' every three years, region B does it every four years, and C every five years, every sixty years they would all freeze, and there would be no witnesses. The simplest hypothesis is that a year passes with no events.
Gist of Idea
If three regions 'freeze' every three, four and five years, after sixty years everything stops for a year
Source
report of Sydney Shoemaker (Time Without Change [1969]) by E.J. Lowe - A Survey of Metaphysics p.247
Book Ref
Lowe,E.J.: 'A Survey of Metaphysics' [OUP 2002], p.247
A Reaction
Lovely argument. I definitely vote for there being a year of time with no events, even though it contradicats Einstein and the rest. As usual, we should be doing ontology, but get lured into epistemology.
| 4226 | If three regions 'freeze' every three, four and five years, after sixty years everything stops for a year [Shoemaker, by Lowe] |
| 8593 | Maybe billions of changeless years have elapsed since my last meal [Shoemaker] |
| 8594 | People have had good reasons for thinking that the circle has been squared [Shoemaker] |
| 8595 | If three regions freeze every 3rd, 4th and 5th year, they all freeze together every 60 years [Shoemaker] |
| 8596 | Inability to measure equality doesn't make all lengths unequal [Shoemaker] |
| 8597 | We couldn't verify the earth's rotation if everyone simultaneously fell asleep [Shoemaker] |
| 8598 | If things turn red for an hour and then explode, we wouldn't say the redness was the cause [Shoemaker] |