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14018
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Is Sufficient Reason self-refuting (no reason to accept it!), or is it a legitimate explanatory tool? [Bourne]
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Full Idea:
Mackie (1983) dismisses the Principle of Sufficient Reason quickly, arguing that it is self-refuting: there is no sufficient reason to accept it. However, a principle is not invalidated by not applying to itself; it can be a powerful heuristic tool.
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From:
Craig Bourne (A Future for Presentism [2006], 6.VI)
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A reaction:
If God was entirely rational, and created everything, that would be a sufficient reason to accept the principle. You would never, though, get to the reason why God was entirely rational. Something will always elude the principle.
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13857
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Truth-functional possibilities include the irrelevant, which is a mistake [Edgington]
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Full Idea:
How likely is a fair die landing on an even number to land six? My approach is, assume an even number, so three possibilities, one a six, so 'one third'; the truth-functional approach is it's true if it is not-even or six, so 'two-thirds'.
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From:
Dorothy Edgington (Do Conditionals Have Truth Conditions? [1986], 3)
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A reaction:
The point is that in the truth-functional approach, if the die lands not-even, then the conditional comes out as true, when she says it should be irrelevant. She seems to be right about this.
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13853
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It is a mistake to think that conditionals are statements about how the world is [Edgington]
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Full Idea:
The mistake philosophers have made, in trying to understand the conditional, is to assume that its function is to make a statement about how the world is (or how other possible worlds are related to it), true or false, as the case may be.
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From:
Dorothy Edgington (Do Conditionals Have Truth Conditions? [1986], 1)
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A reaction:
'If pigs could fly we would never catch them' may not be about the world, but 'if you press this switch the light comes on' seems to be. Actually even the first one is about the world. I've an inkling that Edgington is wrong about this. Powers!
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13854
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Conditionals express what would be the outcome, given some supposition [Edgington]
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Full Idea:
It is often necessary to suppose (or assume) that some epistemic possibility is true, and to consider what else would be the case, or would be likely to be the case, given this supposition. The conditional expresses the outcome of such thought processes.
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From:
Dorothy Edgington (Do Conditionals Have Truth Conditions? [1986], 1)
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A reaction:
This is the basic Edgington view. It seems to involve an active thought process, and imagination, rather than being the static semantic relations offered by possible worlds analyses. True conditionals state relationships in the world.
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7903
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The six perfections are giving, morality, patience, vigour, meditation, and wisdom [Nagarjuna]
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Full Idea:
The six perfections are of giving, morality, patience, vigour, meditation, and wisdom.
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From:
Nagarjuna (Mahaprajnaparamitashastra [c.120], 88)
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A reaction:
What is 'morality', if giving is not part of it? I like patience and vigour being two of the virtues, which immediately implies an Aristotelian mean (which is always what is 'appropriate').
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14019
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Relativity denies simultaneity, so it needs past, present and future (unlike Presentism) [Bourne]
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Full Idea:
Special Relativity denies absolute simultaneity, and therefore requires a past and a future, as well as a present. The Presentist, however, only requires the present.
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From:
Craig Bourne (A Future for Presentism [2006], 6.VII)
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A reaction:
It is nice to accuse Relativity of ontological extravagence. When it 'requires' past and future, that may not be a massive commitment, since the whole theory is fairly operationalist, according to Putnam.
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14003
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Time is tensed or tenseless; the latter says all times and objects are real, and there is no passage of time [Bourne]
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Full Idea:
Theories of time are in two broad categories, the tenseless and the tensed theories. In tenseless theories, all times are equally real, as are all objects located at them, and there is no passage of time from future to present to past. It's the B-series.
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From:
Craig Bourne (A Future for Presentism [2006], Intro IIa)
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A reaction:
It might solve a few of the problems, but is highly counterintuitive. Presumably it makes the passage of time an illusion, and gives no account of how events 'happen', or of their direction, and it leaves causation out on a limb. I'm afraid not.
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14005
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B-series objects relate to each other; A-series objects relate to the present [Bourne]
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Full Idea:
Objects in the B-series are earlier than, later than, or simultaneous with each other, whereas objects in the A-series are earlier than, later than or simultaneous with the present.
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From:
Craig Bourne (A Future for Presentism [2006], Intro IIb)
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A reaction:
Must we choose? Two past events relate to each other, but there is a further relation when 'now' falls between the events. If I must choose, I suppose I go for the A-series view. The B-series is a subsequent feat of imagination. McTaggart agreed.
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14006
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Time flows, past is fixed, future is open, future is feared but not past, we remember past, we plan future [Bourne]
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Full Idea:
We say that time 'flows', that the past is 'fixed' but the future is 'open'; we only dread the future, but not the past; we remember the past but not the future; we plan for the future but not the past.
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From:
Craig Bourne (A Future for Presentism [2006], Intro III)
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A reaction:
These seem pretty overwhelming reasons for accepting an asymmetry between the past and the future. If you reject that, you seem to be mired in a multitude of contradictions. Your error theory is going to be massive.
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