Past, Present, or Future: What’s The Difference?

William E. Mann

doi:10.18290/rf.2018.66.4-7en

William E. Mann Professor Emeritus, from 1974 to 2010, professor at the Faculty of Philosophy at the University of Vermont

DOI: https://doi.org/10.18290/rf.2018.66.4-7en

Keywords: antinomy; future contigents; propositions; events; past; present; future; relativity of time; sphere of culture

Abstract

This essay examines Marcin Tkaczyk’s “The antinomy of future contingent events,” with an eye towards clarifying the roles played by philosophical notions of propositions, events, the present, the relativity of time, and Tkaczyk’s notion of a “sphere of culture.” The essay concludes by examining what support might be offered for Tkaczyk’s claim that people can to some degree change the past.

References

Aristotle’s Categories and De Interpretatione. Translated by J.L. Ackrill. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1963.

Davidson, Donald. 2001. “The Logical Form of Action Sentences.” In Donald Davidson. Essays on Actions and Events. 2nd edition, 105–148. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Feinberg, Joel. 1974, “Action and Responsibility.” In Joel Feinberg. Doing and Deserving: Essays in the Theory of Responsibility. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Kretzmann, Norman. 1985. “Nos ipsi principia sumus: Boethius and the Basis of Contingency.” In Divine Omniscience and Omnipotence in Medieval Philosophy, edited by Tamar Rudavsky, 23–50. Dordrecht: Reidel.

Mann, William E. 2015. “Jephthah’s Plight: Moral Dilemmas and Theism.” In William E. Mann. God, Modality, and Morality. New York: Oxford University Press, 2015, 269–295; translated into Polish and reprinted as “Jefte w tarapatach: Moralne dylematy a teizm.” Translated by Marcin Iwanicki. Roczniki Filozoficzne 65 (2017), no. 4: 351–81. DOI: 10.18290/ rf.2017.65.4-16.

Packer, Herbert L. 1968, The Limits of the Criminal Sanction. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

Stump, Eleonore, & Norman Kretzmann. 1981. “Eternity.” The Journal of Philosophy, 78: 429-458.

Tkaczyk, Marcin “The antinomy of future contingent events,” in typescript. References to passages from this work are embedded in the following text with the indication of the pages of the printed version – in this volume, pp. 5–38.