RJG wrote: ↑April 1st, 2021, 6:39 am
Scott wrote:Things don't happen in a block universe because there is no true space for them to happen in and no true time for them to happen during. In a block universe, time and happening are illusions, illusions that do not happen but just exist eternally like everything else.
If everything is illlusionary, then do illusions
happen?
I think that depends on whether or not one thinks consciousness (and by extension the conscious subject) is fundamental, transcendental, or physically forceful. If we assume for the sake of argument that consciousness is not fundamental, not transcendental, and not physically forceful (which are things I do no assume), then the subjective illusions could not be anything more than physically moot epiphenomenon and thus in that sense no they do not really happen but rather exist as part of the unchanging eternal timeless block universe. In other words, if consciousness is neither transcendental nor forceful then ipso facto it does not transcend nor forcefully change the unchanging eternalness of the block universe.
In contrast, if consciousness is transcendental, fundamental, or physically forceful in some way, then one can argue that a dream is real insofar as it is consciously dreamt. More importantly, conscious
presence would provide a new subjective time-like aspect to the physics, but consciousness not time would be fundamental; the relative time would be the epiphenomenon. Perhaps the most epitimizing example would be
libertarian free will. If libertarian free will exists, then it seems something is happening even if all conscious observation about the external world are illusions.
However, an epiphenomenonal illusion that is physically indistinguishable from that which a philosophical zombie could have does not provide real subjective time that transcends the eternalness of the block universe.
If a philosophical zombie looks at an optical illusion and sees something that doesn't exist, none of that really happened in real time (because there is no objective time in which it could happen) but rather it all exists timelessly in the block universe.
If consciousness is irrelevant to the physics, meaning if consciousness is a non-transcendental non-forceful non-fundamental epiphenomenon, then it's illusions are no more incompatible with the unchangingness of the timeless block universe than a zombie's illusions.
If consciousness is non-transcendental, non-forceful, and non-fundamental, then illusions no more 'happen' (i.e. cause change) then the Moon revolving around the Earth happens. They happen in the wrong everyday sense that Newtonian Mechanics are true and the Earth is generally treated as flat, but they do not really happen. Rather, they all exist in the timeless unchanging block universe.
RJG wrote: ↑April 1st, 2021, 6:39 am
If nothing ever happens, then how can illusions (or experiences) happen? For example, right now I am experiencing typing a response to you on my keyboard. Are you saying my experience (or my illusion) of typing these words did not happen?
Yes, in a sense. In another sense, some like to think of the block universe by thinking as though everything has already happened, as if past, present, and future all already exist in eternal reality. Thus, in one way of speaking about the block universe, we can say that nothing past nor future actually happens, but in another way of speaking about it we can say that the past even and future events have both already happened.
Regardless of the wording, in either way of wording it, the block universe view is incompatible with indeterminism, hence why Einstein famously said that he believed god does not play does.
Thus,
change (i.e.
something happening) is thus being defined as inherently indeterministic.
The everyday meaning of the word 'change' (and by extension 'happening') may refer instead to a process that requires Newtonian Mechanics (i.e. space and objective time). Newtonian Mechanics and flat earth theory are useful falsehoods for certain engineering projects and everyday life, but both are known to be false.
RJG wrote: ↑April 1st, 2021, 6:39 am
It seems to me that it is
logically impossible to deny the existence of
happenings (aka time), because then the denial itself couldn't
happen.
As I said in my previous posts, I believe that is fallacious for the same reason the following is fallacious:
"You cannot say hereness and thereness are not real because you are saying it from over there to me over here."
Hereness, thereness, time, change, and happenings all exist within the illusion that is our everyday Newtonian world. If I go to the grocery store and ask for the milk, and the clerk says, "the milk is over there", I don't scream at him, "Thereness isn't real!" Nonetheless, the fact that we use those terms to very abstractly discuss pseudo-reality does mean they are actually real. Realizing that time and thereness (versus hereness) aren't real contradicts much of what we say and believe on an everyday practical basis.
If you are a building a bridge, designing a house, or doing biology, then fundamental physics is probably not your friend. It's better to use known-to-be-false drastic physical oversimplifications to sidestep the actual physics, hence the sense in which we live in a dream world in which everything is an illusion including the human and brain we see in the mirror, and the mirror.
If we accept the block universe idea, which I do insofar as we assume consciousness is non-transcendental, non-forceful, and non-fundamental (which I don't actually assume), then me writing this post is not really happening in the time-dependent sense of the word happening. Nothing is actually being changed.
The seeming change is an illusion, not an an illusion happening over time but
a time-independent illusion, eternally existing like everything else in the unchanging block universe. That is, if we assume consciousness is non-transcendental, non-forceful, and non-fundamental.