Do you see a problem with this argument?

[Mike Cl]

Read this on the net----
The Truth Conditions of Tensed Propositions
I am an A-theorist with respect to the metaphysics of time. An A-theorist is one who believes that there is an objective 'now' or, what amounts to the same thing, that the totality of reality undergoes change. The opposite of the A-theory of time is called the B-theory. According to the B-theory, reality is constant and unchanging. There may be temporal relations between different parts of reality, but reality itself, taken as a whole, is a static block.

There are several reasons why I'm an A-theorist despite the fact that the B-theory is the philosophical fashion nowadays. One argument in particular that seems persuasive to me is this one:
There are true tensed propositions.
If there are true tensed propositions then there are tensed facts that make those propositions true.
Therefore, there are tensed facts. (from 1 and 2)
If there are tensed facts then there is an objective 'now'.
Therefore, there is an objective 'now'. (from 3 and 4)
Needless to say, this argument is controversial, especially premise 2. Premise 4 is a platitude, a straightforward consequence of the notion of a 'tensed fact'. (The notion of tense has to do with the relation of things to the present or 'now'.)

Premise 1 has been denied by many B-theorists. Bertrand Russell, Willard Quine, and others argued that there are no tensed propositions. The justification for this claim was supposed to lie in the fact that all tensed propositions could be translated salve significatione (without loss of meaning) into tenseless propositions. If that were true, then tense could be safely eliminated.

But during the 1970's and 1980's, in large measure as a result of the work of Richard Gale, B-theorists generally abandoned this strategy. The problem, which Gale and others pointed out, is that tense conveys meaning. For example, it is quite a different thing to be told "A bomb is about to go off (future tense) in the UNLV philosophy department" and "A bomb goes off (tenseless) in the UNLV philosophy department". The former tells me that the bomb has not yet gone off but soon will. (So maybe I should run for cover.) But the latter tells me nothing as to whether the bomb's going off is in the distant past, recent past, present, near future, or distant future. It can't guide my action in the same way because it contains less information. So, pace Russell et al., tense cannot be eliminated without loss of meaning.

Another way to deny Premise 1 is to concede that there are tensed propositions, but deny that any of them are true. I don't know of anyone who has defended this position, but it is a theoretical possibility. One problem with it is that is flies in the face of commonsense. Every natural language known to us has a system of tenses, and speakers of those languages routinely make tensed claims, and many of these claims would be regarded by other competent speakers of those languages as true. Thus, "The Allies won (past tense) WWII" is true; "George W. Bush is (present tense) the President of the U.S." is true; and "The sun will shine (future tense) on the Earth tomorrow" is true. It takes quite a bit of sophistication (sophistry?) to evade the force of commonsense on this point.

Today, the target of choice for nearly all B-theorists is Premise 2. Proponents of the so-called "new" B-theory of time concede that there are true tensed propositions and that they cannot be translated salva significatione into tenseless propositions, but they deny that there have to be tensed facts to make these propositions true. They argue, in other words, that tensed propositions have purely tenseless truth conditions. There are different versions of this strategy (e.g., the "date theory" and the "token-reflexive theory"), but all of them are variations on the same two-part strategy. Given a generic tensed proposition like "It (was, is, will be) the case that E, we generate tenseless truth conditions by
replacing 'was', 'is', and 'will be' with relations like 'earlier than', 'simultaneous with', and 'later than', respectively
specifying as the relata of those relations (i) the event spoken of, E, and (ii) a designated time, e.g., this date, the time of this utterance, etc.
For example, on this view, the truth conditions of "Caesar was assassinated" may be given as follows: "Caesar is (tenseless) assassinated earlier than 07/25/2007."

For my part, I don't think this strategy works. (B-theorists, of course, will beg to differ.) As I see it, to claim that "Caesar was assassinated" is to claim that this event has already happened, that it is past. But a claim is true if and only if what is claimed to obtain does obtain. Since the claim is that this event is past, it is true if and only if the event is past. It's being 'earlier than' some date, whether specified referentially (e.g., 07/25/2007) or token-reflexively (e.g., "the time of this utterance"), is not enough, for in neither case does it require the event to be past, as claimed.

Let me put this another way. Because "Caesar is (tenseless) assassinated earlier than 07/25/2007" is tenseless it gives us no information about whether 07/25/2007 is past, present, or future. As I am writing this, I know that that date has just recently become past. But that knowledge comes from outside the tenseless proposition. In and of itself, the tenseless proposition is perfectly compatible with any of three differently tensed propositions:
Caesar was assassinated.
Caesar is being assassinated.
Caesar will be assassinated.
If satisfying the tenseless truth conditions suffices for the truth of the first tensed proposition then, by reasons of parity, it should also suffice for the truth of the other two and thus of all three. But it can't. These tensed propositions are mutually incompatible. So satisfying tenseless truth conditions cannot suffice for the truth of any tensed proposition.

This was written by Alan Rhoda.  This makes the issue a little clearer.  But not totally clear.  I guess I'm too dense to really get this, or I'm not willing to put in the effort to get a real grasp on it.  Or both.

[SNP1]

Yes, there are two things that render the argument invalid - the first only in our current understanding of the universe, while the latter will not change.

1. Tensed facts have not, as far as I'm aware, been disproved. Therefor point 2 cannot be stated as a fact, and the argument is invalid.

Technically, that doesn't mean it is invalid. It would just mean that it is a deductively valid false argument.

Also, while tensed facts have not been definitively disproven, there are some experiments that support the B-Theory of Time, which is a theory of time where the universe is tenseless.

My favorite experiment is the following:
https://medium.com/the-physics-arxiv-blog/quantum-experiment-shows-how-time-emerges-from-entanglement-d5d3dc850933
http://arxiv.org/abs/1310.4691

2. Who said that a god would have to be a part of this universe? A deity could have designed this universe, with time as an illusion, looking in from outside of it. Potentially as an 8th grade science project. :P

If tensed facts do not exist, then time does not exist. If time does not exist, causality is false. If causality is false, then nothing can cause something else to happen.

If the universe is created then it has a cause, which requires causality, which requires tensed facts to exist.

[dtq123]

Read this on the net----
The Truth Conditions of Tensed Propositions
I am an A-theorist with respect to the metaphysics of time. An A-theorist is one who believes that there is an objective 'now' or, what amounts to the same thing, that the totality of reality undergoes change. The opposite of the A-theory of time is called the B-theory. According to the B-theory, reality is constant and unchanging. There may be temporal relations between different parts of reality, but reality itself, taken as a whole, is a static block.

There are several reasons why I'm an A-theorist despite the fact that the B-theory is the philosophical fashion nowadays. One argument in particular that seems persuasive to me is this one:
There are true tensed propositions.
If there are true tensed propositions then there are tensed facts that make those propositions true.
Therefore, there are tensed facts. (from 1 and 2)
If there are tensed facts then there is an objective 'now'.
Therefore, there is an objective 'now'. (from 3 and 4)
Needless to say, this argument is controversial, especially premise 2. Premise 4 is a platitude, a straightforward consequence of the notion of a 'tensed fact'. (The notion of tense has to do with the relation of things to the present or 'now'.)

Premise 1 has been denied by many B-theorists. Bertrand Russell, Willard Quine, and others argued that there are no tensed propositions. The justification for this claim was supposed to lie in the fact that all tensed propositions could be translated salve significatione (without loss of meaning) into tenseless propositions. If that were true, then tense could be safely eliminated.

But during the 1970's and 1980's, in large measure as a result of the work of Richard Gale, B-theorists generally abandoned this strategy. The problem, which Gale and others pointed out, is that tense conveys meaning. For example, it is quite a different thing to be told "A bomb is about to go off (future tense) in the UNLV philosophy department" and "A bomb goes off (tenseless) in the UNLV philosophy department". The former tells me that the bomb has not yet gone off but soon will. (So maybe I should run for cover.) But the latter tells me nothing as to whether the bomb's going off is in the distant past, recent past, present, near future, or distant future. It can't guide my action in the same way because it contains less information. So, pace Russell et al., tense cannot be eliminated without loss of meaning.

Another way to deny Premise 1 is to concede that there are tensed propositions, but deny that any of them are true. I don't know of anyone who has defended this position, but it is a theoretical possibility. One problem with it is that is flies in the face of commonsense. Every natural language known to us has a system of tenses, and speakers of those languages routinely make tensed claims, and many of these claims would be regarded by other competent speakers of those languages as true. Thus, "The Allies won (past tense) WWII" is true; "George W. Bush is (present tense) the President of the U.S." is true; and "The sun will shine (future tense) on the Earth tomorrow" is true. It takes quite a bit of sophistication (sophistry?) to evade the force of commonsense on this point.

Today, the target of choice for nearly all B-theorists is Premise 2. Proponents of the so-called "new" B-theory of time concede that there are true tensed propositions and that they cannot be translated salva significatione into tenseless propositions, but they deny that there have to be tensed facts to make these propositions true. They argue, in other words, that tensed propositions have purely tenseless truth conditions. There are different versions of this strategy (e.g., the "date theory" and the "token-reflexive theory"), but all of them are variations on the same two-part strategy. Given a generic tensed proposition like "It (was, is, will be) the case that E, we generate tenseless truth conditions by
replacing 'was', 'is', and 'will be' with relations like 'earlier than', 'simultaneous with', and 'later than', respectively
specifying as the relata of those relations (i) the event spoken of, E, and (ii) a designated time, e.g., this date, the time of this utterance, etc.
For example, on this view, the truth conditions of "Caesar was assassinated" may be given as follows: "Caesar is (tenseless) assassinated earlier than 07/25/2007."

For my part, I don't think this strategy works. (B-theorists, of course, will beg to differ.) As I see it, to claim that "Caesar was assassinated" is to claim that this event has already happened, that it is past. But a claim is true if and only if what is claimed to obtain does obtain. Since the claim is that this event is past, it is true if and only if the event is past. It's being 'earlier than' some date, whether specified referentially (e.g., 07/25/2007) or token-reflexively (e.g., "the time of this utterance"), is not enough, for in neither case does it require the event to be past, as claimed.

Let me put this another way. Because "Caesar is (tenseless) assassinated earlier than 07/25/2007" is tenseless it gives us no information about whether 07/25/2007 is past, present, or future. As I am writing this, I know that that date has just recently become past. But that knowledge comes from outside the tenseless proposition. In and of itself, the tenseless proposition is perfectly compatible with any of three differently tensed propositions:
Caesar was assassinated.
Caesar is being assassinated.
Caesar will be assassinated.
If satisfying the tenseless truth conditions suffices for the truth of the first tensed proposition then, by reasons of parity, it should also suffice for the truth of the other two and thus of all three. But it can't. These tensed propositions are mutually incompatible. So satisfying tenseless truth conditions cannot suffice for the truth of any tensed proposition.

This was written by Alan Rhoda.  This makes the issue a little clearer.  But not totally clear.  I guess I'm too dense to really get this, or I'm not willing to put in the effort to get a real grasp on it.  Or both.

Summary please? I'm not interested in reading before my finals for the semester.
(Yes, dumb it down for me. I am dumb, let's move on.)

[Mike Cl]

Summary please? I'm not interested in reading before my finals for the semester.
(Yes, dumb it down for me. I am dumb, let's move on.)

That was the summary. :)

[SNP1]

Let's just say this, time theory is at a high level of philosophy, they don't even cover it in college level introduction courses.

[Sal1981]

Time is tricky to pin down in meaningful language. A lot of "time" gets muddled up in pure semantic strangleholding "past", "present" & "future" events.

I have the view that time is an emergent property of the universe, like, a dimension, of sorts. And I also believe that we only have ideas about tense'd events (instead of merely events) because of memory. It seems all to intuitive that, e.g. "yesterday I ate a ham cheese grilled sandwich, and as I recall, it needed better condiments" or whatever; it's in the language and therefore all too implied by the language we use, just the word "yesterday", "back then", "now", "in a moment", etc. make tense'd events like we're going (moving?) from the past, being in the present moment, towards the future - mostly thanks to our memory and aided by our semantic use of language.

Quantum strangeness, which I'm by no means an expert in, shows us that present moments and things existing in fixed time- & location-frames is false, and that instead it's an inverse relation between velocity & location of discrete particles. But what does this mean for the "present" time-frame? Well, in my layman view it means it's a sort of illusion, that time itself is just something we experience because we're configured to experience it this way, by evolution, by memory and lastly, and not least, language we use.

If we lived in the same strangeness of the quantum world, where positions were blurred with increased accurate velocity, and vice versa, we would probably see that "present moment" was inherently false and that we live in a, sort of, probabilistic world where the advents of events aren't strictly A->B->C->... it also would make up for a fantastic experience of objects.

Entropy. That anything at all happens, that "stuff unfolds" or "time passes" is only because we are slowly sliding from a hill downwards a (ordered energy) slope towards (higher disordered energy) entropy, at least that's a little hypothesis I have about why we experience "present moment" at all. This is doubly so, if there was no shit hitting other shit at all, if there was no clock and no interaction between particles/forces/what-have-you; how would you know that time had passed, hmmm? No, we need events to happen first (I'll lend this causality time depended word just now) before we can say that time passes. There's an important clue about what time is or isn't in there, I think, about interaction.

Of course, ordering stuff up in time & date of events is invaluable. I just don't think there's any real "now" that stuff happens in. Hell, why even time zones hint at "time" itself being maybe just a little more too inconvenient to be true.

Lastly, I think there's no absolute time as a result of this train of thought and probably is merely, as I started out with, an emergent property depended on our own configuration.

[Hakurei Reimu]

Read this on the net----
The Truth Conditions of Tensed Propositions

<ker-snip>

This guy has his head shoved up his ass. (Not you, Mike. The original author of this crock.) He portrays tense as this all-important aspect of propositions and that "Every natural language known to us has a system of tenses". This is catagorically incorrect. Chinese, one of the world's most spoken natural languages, has no tense. It has aspect, but no tense. Whether a named action takes place in the past, present or future must be supplied by the context in which it is spoken. Chinese has words for "today", "tommorrow", etc., but this is just supplying the context in which to evaluate the core statement.

Hell, this guy even tips his hand later on in the piece when he remarks '"George W. Bush is (present tense) the President of the U.S." is true;' â€" well, at the present moment, this is NOT true, but I wouldn't call the guy a liar for this statement because I know that the piece was written in the past. The context the statement is written is absolutely necessary to evaluate its truth value. This is true for all statements, tenseless or tensed, which gives you the temporal signposts to tie tenseless statements to, and thus sever you from tensed statements.

Which brings us to the head when he concludes "Therefore, there is an objective 'now'." Sorry, by special relativity, the 'now' depends on your state of motion. A guy traveling on a speeding rocket will disagree in quite physical ways which events happen 'now', and they will be completely right within their reference frames. Furthermore, I can construct a series of observers and reference frames to bring any event in the past or future into the this so-called "objective 'now'" and have it be just as valid as any other 'now'. Therefore, there is no objective 'now' in this universe. The only theory that is consistent with relativity (special or general) is eternalism.

[Solitary]

Well said!  Solitary

[Jason78]

Is there really a "now", "before" or "after"? If tensed facts exist, then those things do exist. If tensed facts do not exist, then those things do not truly exist (they only appear to exist, similar to an illusion).

Isn't this a false dichotomy? You're asking a question with three parameters and assuming that there is a binary outcome.   

[SNP1]

Isn't this a false dichotomy?

Law of excluded middle. Something either is or is not.

Tensed facts either exist or do not.

If there is a before, but no now or after, there is still a tensed fact.
If there is a now, but no before or after, there is still a tensed fact.
etc.

[Hakurei Reimu]

Law of excluded middle. Something either is or is not.

Tensed facts either exist or do not.

If there is a before, but no now or after, there is still a tensed fact.
If there is a now, but no before or after, there is still a tensed fact.
etc.

I don't think the concept of a "tensed fact" is well formed to begin with. Any "tensed fact" is dependent on the context it is declared in. Once that context is established, then the "tensed fact" is either true or false, regardless of whether or not past, present or future "really exist", because that's not what we mean to establish using the so-called "tensed facts." 'Caesar was assassinated,' is true regardless of whether the past exists or not, because the existential status of the past is simply not germane to what the fact under discussion. The statement is stating the manner of which Ceasar met his end in a time we would call the past, and in any sane history of the man, he was indeed assassinated.