Abstract
Opponents of presentism have often argued that the presentist has difficulty in accounting for what makes (presently) true past-tensed propositions (TptP) true in a way that is compatible with her metaphysical view of time and reality. The problem is quite general and concerns not only strong truth-maker principles, but also the requirement that truth be grounded in reality. In order to meet the challenge, presentists have proposed many peculiar present aspects of the world as grounds for truths concerning the past, such as uninstantiated haecceities, Meinongian non-existents, ersatz times, and dispositional and distributional properties. The main problem with all such solutions is that any explanation of what grounds a TptP that involves the past is eo ipso a better explanation than any that involves only the present. Thus, the quest for an account of grounding for TptP that is compatible with the presentist ontology and ideology is doomed to be explanatorily deficient with respect to eternalism. In a recent article, Ben Caplan and David Sanson have claimed that presentists should change their strategy and, rather than seeking for exotic grounds for TptP, should adopt a more liberal view of explanation. That is, they should allow themselves to resort to “past directed” explanations, even if they do not accept the past in their ontology and ideology. I argue that such a proposal is not compatible with the tenet that there is a substantial distinction between the ideology of such a version of presentism and that of eternalism. Therefore, the presentist cannot endorse such “deflationist” explanations as an easy way out to the problem of the grounding of TptP.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Beebee H. (2003) Causing and nothingness. In: Collins J., Hall H., Paul L. A. (eds) Causation and counterfactuals. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, pp 291–308
Bergmann M. (1996) A new argument from actualism to serious actualism. Nous 30: 356–359
Bergmann M. (1999) (Serious) actualism and (serious) presentism. Nous 33(1): 118–132
Bigelow J. (1996) Presentism and properties. In: Tomberlin J. E. (eds) Philosophical perspectives. Blackwell, Cambridge, MA, pp 35–52
Bourne C. (2006) A future for presentism. Oxford University Press, Oxford
Callender, C. (ms). Time’s ontic voltage. http://philosophy.ucsd.edu/faculty/ccallender/.
Cameron R. P. (2010) Truthmaking for presentists. In: Bennett K., Zimmerman D. (eds) Oxford studies in metaphysics. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 55–100
Caplan B., Sanson D. (2010) The way things were. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 81(1): 24–39
Craig W. L. (2000) The tensed theory of time: A critical examination. Kluwer, Dordrecht
Craig W. L. (2003) In defense of presentism. In: Joikic A., Smith Q. (eds) Time, tense, and reference. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA
Crisp T. (2004a) On presentism and triviality. In: Zimmerman D. (eds) Oxford studies in metaphysics (Vol. 1). Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 15–20
Crisp T. (2004b) Reply to Ludlow. In: Zimmerman D. (eds) Oxford studies in metaphysics (Vol. 1).. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 37–46
Crisp T. (2007) Presentism and grounding. Nous 41: 90–109
Davidson M. (2003) Presentism and the non-present. Philosophical Studies 113: 77–92
Dolev Y. (2007) Time and realism. The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA
Dorato M. (2006) The irrelevance of the presentist/eternalist debate for the ontology of Minkowski spacetime. In: Dieks D. (eds) The ontology of spacetime. Elsevier, Amsterdam, pp 93–109
Fine K. (2005) Tense and reality. In: Fine K. (eds) Modality and tense: Philosophical papers. Oxford University Press, Oxford
Hudson H. (1997) On a new argument from actualism to serious actualism. Nous 31(4): 520–524
Keller S. (2004) Presentism and truthmaking. In: Zimmerman D. (eds) Oxford studies in metaphysics. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 93–104
Kierland B., Monton B. (2007) Presentism and the objection from being-supervenience. Australasian Journal of Philosophy 85(3): 485–497
Lombard L. B. (1999) On the alleged incompatibility of presentism and temporal part. Philosophia 27(1–2): 253–260
Ludlow P. (2004) Presentism, triviality, and the varieties of tensism. In: Zimmerman D. (eds) Oxford studies in metaphysics (Vol. 1). Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 21–36
Markosian N. (2004) A defense of presentism. In: Zimmerman D. (eds) Oxford studies in metaphysics. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 47–82
Mellor D. H. (1998) Real time II. Routledge, London
Merricks T. (2007) Truth and ontology. Oxford University Press, Oxford
Meyer U. (2005) The presentist’s dilemma. Philosophical Studies 122: 213–225
Parsons J. (2005) Truthmakers, the past, and the future. In: Beebee H., Dodd J. (eds) Truthmakers: The contemporary debate. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 161–174
Savitt, S. F. (2006). Presentive and eternalism in perspective. In D. Dieks (Ed.), The ontology of spacetime. Amsterdam: Elsevier. http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/archive/00001788/01/PEP.pdf.
Sider T. (1999) Presentism and ontological commitment. The Journal of Philosophy 96(7): 325–347
Sider T. (2006) Quantifiers and temporal ontology. Mind 115: 75–97
Sider T. (2009) Ontological realism. In: Chalmers D., Manley D., Wasserman R. (eds) Metametaphysics. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 384–423
Tallant J. (2009) Presentism and truth-making. Erkennntnis 71(3): 407–416
Varzi A. (2008) Failures, omissions, and negative descriptions. In: Korta K., Garmendia J. (eds) Meaning, intentions, and argumentation. CSLI Publications, Stanford, pp 61–75
Williams C. (1996) The metaphysics of A- and B-time. The Philosophical Quarterly 46(184): 371–381
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Torrengo, G. The grounding problem and presentist explanations. Synthese 190, 2047–2063 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-011-9955-z
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-011-9955-z