Episteme
Abstract
Apart from our uses of time, in what way does time really exist? Given two possible assumptions—time is objective and time is subjective—the author argues that time is not objective and empirical but rather phenomenologically ideal. The negative argument critiques Sydney Shoemaker’s thought-experiment about changeless time intervals, finding it too radically imagined and containing conceptual conflation. The positive argument invokes Kant’s thoughts on the Transcendental Illusion and Robert K. C. Forman’s knowledge-by-identity theory. Furthermore, the author describes a thought experiment meant to counter Shoemaker’s. In conclusion, Occam’s razor and the author’s logic prefer time as subjective over time as objective: change without time is possible, whereas time without change is not.
Recommended Citation
Osborne, Robert
(2010)
"Time and Consciousness: A Phenomenological View,"
Episteme: Vol. 21, Article 5.
Available at:
https://digitalcommons.denison.edu/episteme/vol21/iss1/5