Three views on the relationship between time and reality

Mauro Dorato

pp. 61-92

in: Jan Faye, UWE Scheffler, Max Urchs (eds), Perspectives on time, Berlin, Springer, 1997

Abstract

In the eleventh book of the Confessions, Augustine contrasts the easiness with which we talk about time (by taking for granted that we understand it) with our incapacity of explaining what it is to others. He candidly acknowledges that he knows what time is only if nobody asks him ([4], XI, 14,17) . "Becoming" , being a term of the philosophical art, does not even enjoy this rather peculiar advantage, since it is neither familiar to the man in the street, nor transparent to our intuition. What exactly is temporal becoming? What does it mean for it to be mind-independent?