The Reality of Tensed Time

The Reality of Tensed Time

0.1 Intro
There have been countless questions and debates over the existence of time. Many people wondered questions like: Is time real, and if so, how can we measure it? How about the memories that we have regarding the past experiences and events that we lived through, do they exist? There are countless other questions that are out there regarding the existence of time, wondering if time exists. In this paper, I’m going to criticize D. H. Mellor’s Argument in the article “The Unreality of Tense” from the book The New Theory of Time. In addition to discussing Mellor’s theory regarding tensed time, I will criticize Mellor’s argument and state what I believe on topics that Mellor discussed in his article, like his theory of change, the past, present, and future leading themselves to contradictions, and McTaggart’s Proof on time.

1.0 D. H. Mellor’s Argument

1.1 …Change…

In his article, Mellor tells us he discredited “the tensed idea of change (1981).” Mellor believes that tensed time isn’t real because using tensed expressions to describe past and future events lead to contradictions. Mellor discussed his thoughts on change. It is having a property at one moment and at another moment it is completely different. We observe change as situations change over duration of time. But the thing is we need time for us to observe change. Mellor believes that we can refer to the past and future events to how it relates to ‘now’ and relate change to what properties objects have at the present ‘now.’

“Change is still defined as variation through time… (1981).” Mellor believes that time, in reference in tense, leads to contradictions because it claims that time hold being past, present, and future all at once. Mellor believes that things can change; only referenced to itself from previous. Mellor stated that McTaggart believes that “time needs change and change needs changing tense… (1981).” Mellor said in his article that tense has a place in world today, and that place is in our minds, because if we try to make sense of it, it leads us nowhere. With being unable to use tense sentences to help describe what happened in the past or what will happen in the future, referencing to the past, the present, and the future will lead to contradictions.

1.2 …The Past, the Present, and the Future Are Contradictions…

Mellor did mention, according to A-theory of time, time moving from future to the present to the past is an illusion. A single event can not be present and future if it is past, or past and future if it is present, or past and present while being future. An event can’t have those three properties at the same time, which they can only have them successively, moving from future to present to past. So let’s talk about an event that I’m familiar with, such as professional wrestling legend Ric Flair winning his ninth out of sixteen World Heavyweight Championships. Before he started his career, the person that became known as Ric Flair never knew that he was going to win nine World Heavyweight Championships, more less sixteen before he finished his career, and when he did win his ninth World Championship, he didn’t know he was going to go on and win seven more before he ended his 36-year career. So, looking at Flair winning his ninth World Heavyweight Championship, it was later than Abe Lincoln being elected as the sixteenth President of the United States and earlier than George W. Bush being elected as our forty-fourth President of the United States. To be more exact, Ric Flair winning his ninth World Title in January 19th, 1992 was earlier than formal end of the Cold War between the USSR and the US on February 1st, 1992, and later than the collapse of the Soviet Union on December 25th, 1991 . So looking at Ric Flair’s ninth World Heavyweight Title reign in the beginning of 1992, we can relate things be being earlier and later than his championship reign. Along with change being entangled with time and the past, the present, and the future contradict each other, Mellor restated McTaggart’s proof of the unreality of tensed time.

1.3 ....McTaggart’s Proof…

Mellor restated McTaggart’s proof that the properties that make up the A-series are incompatible and time is just an illusion. Mellor described the past, present, and future as being unable to share the same property at the same time, meaning that any event being present can’t be past and future due in part that it is happening right now. As well as that, Mellor states that the A-series has the same positions that are past, present, and future (1981). But what I just described, those two things lead us to a contradiction and we can not apply them to reality. Therefore, “reality… must be tenseless: there are no tensed facts (1981).”
Mellor argues that absolutely nothing can have the properties of being past, present, and future all at the same time, due in part if applied at the same time; they’ll lead us to a contradiction. Let us use the example of me writing this paper, I can only refer me writing my paper to it being earlier than an event or after an event. Like the Presidential Elections for the United States on Tuesday, November 4th, 2008, I will be writing this paper earlier than the elections taking place, but me writing this paper is after Hurricane Katrina hitting southern U.S. in the summer of 2005. To Mellor and McTaggart, all three propositions of me writing this paper can be true at the same time. At the current time (of either me writing this paper or you reading this paper, depending on how you look at it) all three writings of this paper aren’t true. After discussing Mellor’s arguments, I’m going to criticize his arguments and state my opinions compared to his arguments.

2.0 My Attack on Mellor’s Argument

2.1 …Change…

Look at time, for instance, there is 31,536,000 seconds in a year, so there’s over 31 million times changes can occur. Time is continuous, meaning it can not be discontinuous and it can’t jump around. Time can’t jump from 12:38 pm on Wednesday to 8:52 am on Saturday. Time will be continuous from being 12:38 pm Wednesday to 8:52 am Saturday. When people sleep, time will remain continuous, as well as stay continuous when we’re in class, at work, or hanging out with friends on a Sunday afternoon watching the football game. Time will remain continuous no matter what event we’re attending or where our spouse or best friend’s at. The events you participate at change over time and are consecutive with one another. You’re not going to be at a million events over the year, or even in the tens of thousands of events during the period of twelve months, but the events you go to will change, like your transportation to such, your clothes, your hair style, etc.
As an example, with more and more words I put into this paper and more sentences and paragraphs I construct, my paper gets longer and longer. With the length of my paper, more time it takes me to write it and longer for you to read it and more time for it to be finished. Granted there’s going to be a space of when I finished with my paper to you reading it, but it’s going to be a continuous time in-between the two events, and there will be events during me finishing my paper and you reading my paper, so time is continuous during such interval. B-theorist can easily describe these events in B-terms, but to me, that doesn’t make sense because I’m used to talking about events being in the future, happening right now, or happened in the past. At the beginning of the semester, it was in the future of me writing this paper. On Sunday, November 2nd, 2008, I am currently working on the paper. Then on Thursday, November 6th and later dates, my paper being written would become past. This paper being written moves from being in the future to being all the way in the past in a continuous state, so it’s hard to say that the tensed expressions are incorrect. Time and change is something that we need to be able to discuss the past, the present, and the future.

2.2 …The Past, the Present, and the Future Are Contradictions…

In my opinion, if you try to compare everything to the current ‘now,’ it will be forever changing and never fully stationary. Let’s look at the case I used before, the case of Ric Flair winning his ninth World Heavyweight Championship, which would be his second World Wrestling Federation World Heavyweight Championship (now World Wrestling Entertainment [WWE]) in September 1992 , currently, yeah, it happened in the past, and we can easily reference it in B-terms and go on our marry way. But people don’t talk and reference events and experiences in B-terms in everyday language. Yes, September 1st, 1992, is gone, but yesterday compared to tomorrow; it is two totally different B-terms because the ‘now’ changes. But let’s talk about his ninth World Heavyweight Championship reign. He won it in September 1st, 1992 and lost it in October 12th of the same year, before hand, during, and after, was all continuous. Days, weeks, months, and years have gone by since Flair lost his ninth World Heavyweight Championship, in fact, sixteen years after the fact, but it was all one long continuous timeframe. Men decided how many hours are in a day, days in a week, weeks in a month, and months in a year, so easily we can reference Flair’s ninth title reign in B-terms. But I’m positive that you ask any typical wrestling fan, past who watched Ric Flair, or current wrestling fan, if asked, they all would talk about Ric Flair’s ninth World title reign in A-terms. It’s hard for me to view Mellor’s view point, especially trying to look at it in a stand point of an interest that I have, like the career of Ric Flair. I can’t view Flair’s whole career and the highlights of his career, like his sixteen World Heavyweight Championships in three different organizations, countless number of matches he’s partaken in that are considered to be the greatest matches, and reference them today and then reference them each passing day, and consider the time to be the same. In ten years, no one is really going to know who Ric Flair was or all the things he did for the business. So in time, the reference and relevance of Ric Flair will change. It’s hard for me to reference Flair’s sixteen World Title win in May of 2000 and his first World Title win in September 1981 . It was the past, the present, and the future that, in Mellor’s opinion, lead to contradictions. I’m going to contradict Mellor in explaining McTaggart’s Proof.

2.3 ....McTaggart’s Proof…

McTaggart’s proof consists of the B-series of time is real and A-series of time doesn’t because it leads to a contradiction due in part of the past, present, and future moving from future to past at a constant speed. B-series refers everything to earlier than or later than the current moment and don’t use the terms of past, present, or future because they lead to a contradiction when using the all at once. For me, you simply can’t apply the past, present, and future at the same time because it doesn’t make sense of looking at an event and thinking it’s in the future, it’s happening right now, and it already happened. Let’s look at the case I used to defend McTaggart’s proof above, the coming elections in United States.
The upcoming elections in the United States will decide who’s going to become forty-fifth President. The election is on Tuesday, November 4th, and on November 4th, beginning of the semester is past and the end of the semester is in the future. When this semester began, we had no clue which candidate is going to be elected. If, at that time, we looked at the elections of being in the future, this was being present, and being in the past, that just wouldn’t make sense. It wouldn’t make sense because most people don’t look at events of being in the future, happening right now, and being in the past. Time is continuous, from beginning of the Fall 2008 semester to the 2008 Presidential election to finals week to the semester being over. You can look at time being continuous as being an illusion, but what normal person looks at time not being continuous? No normal person would look at time that way. But all-in-all, time is a set at a constant, continuous speed moving from being future to being now to being in the past.

3.0 Conclusion

To conclude the paper, I believe that time is real from the experiences and events that we live through, in terms of tensed expressions. It’s hard to dispute the facts of the continuous state of time and its experiences that it brings upon us when it moves from future to present to past. As my examples from the paper, as me writing this paper to Ric Flair winning his ninth World Heavyweight Championship in September 1992 to there being 31,536,000 seconds in a year, it’s hard to look at these facts and talk about time with no reference of them being from the future, present, or the past. No matter how much proof one can have on the argument that time with tense expressions causes contradictions, everyday people talk like A-theory and talk with tense expression. I say that because we break our days into night and day with the earth’s rotation. We also break up our time awake to going to work, eating meals, hanging out with family and friends, etc. As a result, I’m at the conclusion that tensed time exists.