What is the relation between time and human minds?Is

The debate we have been following is in part based on the distinction be- tween global and local characters of the universe. "Global" and "local" are, in general, two important – and then weird – terms in philosophy.

Now, we have just found Horwich defending locality in order to main- tain the variability of temporal sense as a relevant possibility, and Earman proposing a global method to determine the "right" sense of time. In both cases the problem of "which-is-which sense" is not resolve: in Horwich’s account the time "sense" changes in the various regions of space in re- lation to their dominant dynamical processes, whatever it may mean; in Earman’s account there is only one time "sense", but, without theoretical integrations, we do not know which it is. In any case, what we know is that there is an objective sense. And "objective" means "non-subjective" ("objective" and "subjective" are two important – and weird – terms in phi- losophy, too).

Next, we shall find another debate based on the distinction between lo- cal and global, in which the issue will be the reality of time, and the global viewpoint will be used to declare the unreality thereof. As a result, in that case time will turn out to be something non-objective. Rather, in the expla- nations of the upholders of that thesis, the omni-pervasive phenomenon of time, which remains nevertheless undeniable, will be reduced to the range of subjective perception or elaboration of sensations by human brain.

We already know that this is the ultimate heuristic strategy of every eliminativistic theses about time, and both in the case of theses à la McTag- gart (namely, that time as a whole is unreal) and in the cases of elimina- tion of the character of passage (and becoming) in the Block view. For in- stance, let us read a page from Grünbaum’s Philosophical Problems of Space and Time.

I maintain with Bergmann20 that the transient now with respect to

which the distinction between the past and the future of common sense and psychological time acquires meaning has no relevance at all apart from the egocentric perspectives of a conscious (human) or- ganism and from the immediate experiences of an organism. If this contention is correct, then both in a indeterministic and in a determin- istic world, the coming onto being or becoming of an event, as distinct from its merely being, is thus no more than the entry of its effect(s) into the immediate awareness of a sentient organism (man). For what is the dif- ference between these two worlds in regard to the determinateness of the future events? The difference concerns only the type of func- tional connection linking the attributes of the future events to those of present or past events. But this difference does not make for a precipitation of future events into existence in a way in which deter- minism does not. Nor does indeterminacy make for any difference whatever at any time in regard to the attribute-specificity of the future events themselves. For in either kind of universe, it is a fact of logic that what will be, will be! The result of a future quantum measure- ment may not be definite prior to its occurrence in relation to earlier states, and thus our prior knowledge of it correspondingly cannot be definite. But as an event, it is as fully attribute-definite and occurs just as a measurement made in a deterministic world does. The belief that in an indeterministic world, the future events come into being or become actual or real with the passage of time would appear to con- fuse two quite different things: (1) the epistemological precipitation of the the actual event-properties allowed by the quantum-mechanical probabilities, and (2) an existential coming into being or becoming actual or real. Only the epistemological precipitation is affected by the passage of time through the transformation of statistical expectation into a definite piece of information. But this does not show that in an indeterministic world there is any kind of precipitation into existence or coming into being with the passage of time. And even in a determinis- tic world, the effects of physical events come into our awareness at a certain time and in that sense can be thought of as coming into being. [Grü73], p. 324

This long passage can teach us many things, but at least three are im- portant for us now:

(1) When we talk about time as a whole, with every one of its alleged characters, or about temporal passage and becoming as separable

features of common-sense-time, the particular character of the dy- namical laws, whether deterministic or indeterministic, is immate- rial.

(2) When one talks about the dependence of passage/becoming on mind, one is not talking about subjectivity in a proper sense.

(3) All the talks about the reality or unreality of time are ultimately about the sense of reality in general.

We won’t discuss (1)21_{. About (2), which should be our topic in this}

paragraph, I can say only few words.

That I’m never talking about my awareness of temporal succession or of any event coming into being, rather than about yours, my reader, is clear. We are talking about the relationships between human minds and the world. Of course, the latter is seen as an "external" reality, compared with the "internal" reality of the "theater of consciousness".

In any case, few philosophers – and fewer physicists – are so auda- cious to assume a rigorously skeptical, and then solipsistic position. In- deed, the old mind-body problem is often declined as the brains-world problem, in which the brains and the world are ontologically "objective" entities. And even the references to consciousness or awareness in Grün- baum’s text are not a clue against this "objectivistic" assumption. Let’s read another Grünbaum’s passage, in which the connection between language and consciousness is explicit.

[W]hat qualifies a physical event at a time t as belonging to the present or as now is not some physical attribute of the event or some rela- tion it sustains to other purely physical events; instead what so qual- ifies the event is that at the time t at least one human or other mind- possessing organism M experiences the event at that time. But what is the content of M’s conceptual awareness at time t that he is experi- encing a certain event at that time? M’s experience of the event at time tis coupled with a state of knowing that he has that experience at all. And that awareness does not, in general, comprise information con- cerning the date or the numerical clock time of the occurrence of the event. In other words, M experiences the event at t and is aware at t of having that certain experience simultaneously with an awareness of the fact of having it at all. For example, if I just hear a noise at time t, then the noise does not qualify at t as now unless at t I am judg- mentally aware of the fact of my hearing it at all and of the temporal coincidence of the hearing with that awareness.

21_{For a recent discussion of the relation of time with determinism and indetermin-}

[Grü67], p. 17-18

Despite the continuous attention that Grünbaum shows in the text for the awareness, which is usually supposed to be a subjective feature, it is clearly said that the "mind-possessing organism M" must be "judgemen- tally aware". And judgements do entail language. In other word, the per- ceiving subject must be a speaking subject, i.e., he must be capable to use language to express his having a perception of an event at a certain time and his being simultaneously aware thereof. But language is clearly not a ’solitary game’. And even if it is not used in face-to-face talking. There- fore, what is at issue here is not subjectivity and the mysterious private world of the consciousnesses, but the relation between two (real) systems in the same (real) world, i.e., spacetime and its observer22_.

Now, if the relation that can explain the dynamical character of time is between two entities in the same ontological canvas, and even if one wants to ascribe special and unique features to human mind (e.g., its "ego- centric perspective"), there is always the problem how human mind can "produce" time, and then motion in a static universe, without being itself in time, and then without having any possibility of movement. And one can hardly affirm in the modern scientific context, and then without ap- pealing to the qualities of a special substance like the Cartesian cogito or something else independent of the material world, that thinking, or what- ever brains make, is an atemporal, or even instantaneous event (see, e.g., [Dob69], p. 320-321).

In any case, I do not wish to discuss this question any longer. Rather, it will be difficult even to say really something about (3) in the next chapters. Indeed, the entire discourse that Grünbaum does about the "fact of logic that what will be, will be" would be probably subscribed by Hartmann, considering his conception of the "reality of the future" both in Möglichkeit und Wirklichkeit and in Philosophie der Nature. The different position of the

22_{Moreover, as a confirmation of this interpretation, we can find another clue in a foot-}

note to the quoted passage (Ivi, p. 17, n. 12). Grünbaum highlights therein that M can be an alien, as well as an artificial intelligence, and that the only requisite that it needs is to have a "physical substratum" for its consciousness. Thus, in order to escape from any possible limited account of his thesis, Grünbaum has felt it necessary to deny also any connection to anthropocentricity, on one hand, but also to a Cartesian conception of the mind-body problem, according to which the thinking substance is separated from the extensive one, the body. On the other hand, for an interpretation that sees hidden traces of "mentalism or spiritualism" in Grünbaum see [Dob69], p. 321. In any case, I think that the non-reductionist view of the mental states, which emerges from Grünbaum pages (see, e.g., [Grü67], p. 26, n. 29), can be also read as a sort of non-subjectivist idealism (in a Platonic fashion), rather than a spiritualism.

Latvian philosopher lies in the conception of reality itself. Hartmann is quite clear: real being is becoming, for the static, atemporal being is the ideal one. Yes, also according to him reality has to do with something universal and in some sense ideal, i.e., the categories, but one of these categories must be time, and not in the form of a mere concept, potentially only in mente.

On the other hand, Grünbaum or another Block theorist, or also a new supporter of McTaggart’s view can go on overlooking Hartmann’s ontol- ogy, and assuming a reality without becoming, time, or even spacetime. And according to them with good reasons.

Maybe, from that viewpoint, the previous problem about the possi- bility of using mind or brain to explain the omni-pervasive, but false ap- pearance of a temporal reality can be reformulated in this way: if the real- ity (matter?) is only a mathematical (but non-geometrical) structure, how can a (mathematical?) thing like mind/brain transform this (configuration space?) reality into a spacetime without doing nothing in the standard sense of doing, i.e., acting in time? And the answer may be, in a sort of Aristotelian fashion: mind is a function, namely, just a (re)mapping from the real configuration space, say, of a QG theory onto the illusory geomet- rical spacetime.

Has it any sense? I don’t know. And I really don’t know whether, in the next chapters, something will be said that can change any aspect of the debate about the sense of reality. Sincerely, I don’t think. But all this weird – and then philosophically important – talking makes me remember a particular hystorical overview by Hartmann of the relation between the atemporal world and the intellect23_.

The world of Ideas was originally considered the best or «supreme» being, the realm of the perfect and the divine, because it is a realm of the eternal, of what is not touched by the becoming, and is saved from death. In Neoplatonism it was identified with the pure νοῦς, which is, according to Aristotle, concerned only with itself, and which is, so interpreted, the divine νοῦς. The realm of the essences is kept alive in Scholasticism as content of the intellectus divinus. And so even Leibniz interpreted it as the embodiment of the «eternal truths». But also in Kant’s transcendental subject, and even in Husserl’s eidetic sphere, one can still recognize a reflection of this sublimity.

[Har35], p. 291

23_{For a review of Hartmann’s position on the mind-body problem, also in comparison}

Existence and essence (part I):

spacetime and geometry.

5.1

Time and spacetime in trouble.

The phenomenological concept of time has been attacked in many ways and since its origin in philosophy. Rather, even before that origin. We have seen in the previous chapter that there have been – at least – two general strategies for eliminating the dynamical account of time:

1. McTaggart’s way, namely, declaring the unreality of time because of the absurdity of the dynamical features of time, interpreted as essen- tial characters;

2. The "frozen time" approach, typical of the Block view or the static presentism, consisting in eliminating from the concept of time any dynamical aspect, i.e., any reference to temporal passage, transient now, or becoming.

Of course, (2) is usually not an eliminativist conception, even if un- derstood as a mere spatialization of time, and coupled with other anti- intuitive assumptions, like the isotropy of time. Nevertheless, a reduction- ist strategy similar to the Block View’s one has been the starting point for those who want to reduce the concept of time to something else. And this reductionist idea underlies also the last attempts to eliminate time with the help of physics. Indeed, the strategy of some contemporary theorists con- sists in leading the reduction of temporal characters (also the geometrical one) to such a limit that time is thought to disappear at a certain (basic) level of reality.