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Encyclopedia of Database Systems pp 4144–4149Cite as

Time in Philosophical Logic

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Synonyms

Logic of time; Temporal logic

Definition

The aim of the study of time in philosophical logic is to provide a conceptual framework for an interdisciplinary study of the nature of time and to formalize and study various conceptions and systems of time. In addition, the introduction of time into logic has led to the development of formal systems, which are particularly well suited to represent and study temporal phenomena such as program execution, temporal databases, and argumentation in natural language.

Historical Background

The philosophy of time is based on a long tradition, going back to ancient thought. It is an accepted wisdom within the field that no attempt to clarify the concept of time can be more than an accentuation of some aspects of time at the expense of others. Plato’s statement that time is the “moving image of eternity” and Aristotle’s suggestion that “time is the number of motion with respect to earlier and later” are no exceptions (see [17]). According to...

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Recommended Reading

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark

    Peter Øhrstrøm

  2. Royal School of Library and Information Science, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen S, Denmark

    Per F. V. Hasle

Authors
  1. Peter Øhrstrøm
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  2. Per F. V. Hasle
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Peter Øhrstrøm .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Georgia Institute of Technology College of Computing, Atlanta, GA, USA

    Ling Liu

  2. University of Waterloo School of Computer Science, Waterloo, ON, Canada

    M. Tamer Özsu

Section Editor information

  1. University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA

    Richard T. Snodgrass

  2. Aalborg University, Aalborg Øst, Denmark

    Christian S. Jensen

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Øhrstrøm, P., Hasle, P.F. (2018). Time in Philosophical Logic. In: Liu, L., Özsu, M.T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Database Systems. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-8265-9_389

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