Time, Language and Ontology:

The World from the B-Theoretic Perspective

by

M. Joshua Mozersky

I am currently in the process of completing a book-length manuscript on the semantics and ontology of time. Below is a chapter-by-chapter outline of the arguments in the book. I plan to have a completed manuscript by the fall of 2007.

Time, Language and Ontology: The World from the B-theoretic Perspective

1. Introduction

In this chapter I lay out the groundwork for the remainder of the book. I argue that the B-theory is a combination of two views: an ontological doctrine, eternalism, according to which all times are equally real, and the tenseless theory of time, according to which the logical form of temporal language involves only tenseless predicates. I lay out the strategy and general methodology that guides the remainder of the book. In particular, I justify my claim that the analysis of the logical form of natural (temporal) language is the proper grounding for a metaphysics of time.

2. The Future Tense

I examine the doctrine, motivated by various philosophical concerns, that propositions about the future differ semantically from those about the past and present. I suggest that such views require metaphysical motivation, namely a picture of reality that ontologically distinguishes the future from other times. I argue that: (1) the temporally asymmetric semantic systems are all less plausible than a temporally uniform account; (2) the metaphysical pictures that underlie the asymmetric systems are inherently unstable. Hence, there is no reason to ontologically distinguish the future from other times.

3. Presentism

If there is no ground for an ontologically distinguished future, then it seems reasonable to suppose that propositions about the future are rendered true or false by entities that exist then. Many philosophers, however, object to the notion of truth conditions that exist outside of the present. Presentism, the doctrine that only the present exists, has many defenders. I argue that the presentist must provide an account of tensed language that is consistent with her metaphysical position. I survey attempts to do so and find them to be unconvincing. Accordingly, I conclude that eternalism is the appropriate ontological stance.

4. Tensed Predicates

In this chapter I examine the predicates ‘is past’, ‘is present’ and ‘is future’. I argue that their usage is consistent with eternalism by demonstrating that the propositions they (help to) express are tenseless in logical form. In other words, the semantics of these predicates involves only the tenseless relations ‘is earlier than’, ‘is simultaneous with’ and ‘is later than’, which are best combined with eternalism rather than a temporally restricted ontology. I defend this stance against a number of recent challenges.

5. Experience and the Present

A special class of temporal propositions are those expressed by our beliefs about what is occurring in the present. Can eternalism combined with the tenseless theory of time explain the experiential uniqueness of the present? In this chapter I answer in the affirmative by presenting a tenseless account of the presence of experience. I argue that the content of belief about the present is tenseless but that the experiential uniqueness of such content is the result of non-propositional, causal skills employed by agents. I conclude that tensed language and belief is, at the level of logical form, tenseless; therefore, the B-theory is the correct account of time.

6. Temporal Relations and Ordinary Objects

There are many temporal locutions that are not explicitly tensed. In this chapter I work out a general account of temporal predication by explicating the logical structure of propositions expressed by locutions of the form ‘x is F at t’. Such locutions are what allow us to describe change without contradiction. I defend a relational account of temporal predication, hence a relational account of variation in time. This theory is consistent with both the B-theory and three-dimensionalism, the view that objects lack temporal parts.

7. Temporal Parts

A popular alternative to the theory defended in chapter 6 is four-dimensionalism: the view that objects persist in virtue of having temporal parts which are wholly located at particular times. Temporal parts satisfy monadic, rather than relational, temporal predicates. In other words, for the temporal parts theorist, x is F at t not in virtue of standing in an F-relation to t but, rather, in virtue of having a temporal part, located at t, that is F simpliciter. I examine recent defences of the metaphysics of temporal parts and find them to present an unconvincing competitor to three-dimensionalism. I present a three-dimensionalist perspective on various ‘paradoxes’ of material constitution as well as an account of ‘wholly present’ that sidesteps contemporary disputes.

8. Conclusion

Here I sum up the foregoing discussion. The picture of temporal reality that I defend combines two elements: (1) eternalism, the view that all times and their contents are (tenselessly) equally real; and (2) three-dimensionalism, the theory that objects, not temporal parts, instantiate temporal predicates, and such predicates can be three-dimensional, such as ‘is spherical’. The picture of temporal language that I present combines two views: (1) the tenseless theory of time, according to which tensed locutions express some combination of tenseless predicates; and (2) the relational account of temporal predication, the view that ordinary, temporary predicates are relations between objects and times. To finish, I explain why I believe my account to be consistent with contemporary, scientific investigations into the nature of time.