According to theory of relativity, time is a special kind of space. So you could say that the rock of yesterday or tomorrow exists in that space, just in a different location. — litewave

So then the passage of time is an illusion, we experience every moment "simultaneously".

But we are "flatland" creatures living in a 4d universe confined to a 3d space, which, from our perspective, is drifting through the 4th dimension. Is 3d space real to flatlanders? I would say, only to the extent that it impinges on their 2d world. Events in 3d space which do not intersect their 2d world do not exist for the flatlanders.

The past and future are right here, embodied in the present. — hypericin

I don't know what you mean by that. Can I touch the past and the future? Can you point to it so I can verify it exists?

Your current state of affairs all flow directly from the event of your birth. Therefore your birth is a real event, ... — hypericin

It probably was a real event. We have reason to think that. Does that still exist today? I would argue no, and thus it is not real. Just a memory, a conception, a reasoned argument, but nothing real.

... you experience it right now, ... — hypericin

I don't believe I am experiencing my birth right now, unless we have very different ideas of what it means to be born.

Can I touch the past and the future? Can you point to it so I can verify it exists? — Tzeentch

When you touch a Greek stature you are touching the present day successor to a far past event and object. When you wrote the above your past writing reverberated into my present. I see it right now.

Just a memory, a conception, a reasoned argument, but nothing real. — Tzeentch

The distinction between "real" and "unreal" is the distinction between mind independence and mind dependence. A rock is mind independent, and so real, while a dragon is completely mind dependent. The event of your birth does not depend on the state of anyone's mind. It is real, and it's mind independent reality extends to right now.

I don't believe I am experiencing my birth right now, unless we have very different ideas of what it means to be born. — Tzeentch

You're whole life is the experience of your birth.

When you touch a Greek stature you are touching the present day successor to a far past event and object. When you wrote the above your past writing reverberated into my present. I see it right now. — hypericin

I think that's an illusion. When I touch a Greek statue, I touch a Greek statue in the present. Everything I associate with that Greek statue, including its history, happens in my mind. We may have ideas of what the statue represents, where it came from, how old it is, but these are just educated guesses by historians. There's nothing real about that in the philosophical sense.

The event of your birth does not depend on the state of anyone's mind. — hypericin

I think it does. Recollections of the past are notoriously subjective. If there is no one around to remember my birth, does it still exist? If so, where?

You're whole life is the experience of your birth. — hypericin

I think I am just experiencing life in the present right now.

There's nothing real about that in the philosophical sense. — Tzeentch

To be "real" means to be mind independent. Do you really believe historical events are not mind independent?

If there is no one around to remember my birth, does it still exist? If so, where? — Tzeentch

As long as you are alive or your life had impacts, it exists in its effects on the world. Eventually that effect will fade away.

To be "real" means to be mind independent. — hypericin

There's the hook, little fishy.

what

You are choosing to think in antirealist terms. The consequence is rejecting bivalence and moving to non-classical logic. Hence your question, in the OP.

Perhaps you think you are describing how things are. But what you are doing is choosing between various ways of talking about how things are. I suspect you suppose yourself to have made a metaphysical discovery, that events in the past and future do not have a truth value. You haven't.

In the way of speaking you have chosen, there may be no truths about past and future events. Now it seems to me that this forms a reductio, and a good reason for rejecting antirealism; that it is better to choose a way of talking that permits events in the past to be true or false.

All this to return to the answer to your question: It is true that the rock existed yesterday.

The one in my yard, that Wife wants moved over to the new garden bed. It's been under the tree for years. This is how we do, and also how we ought, talk about rocks.

But that little hook, 'To be "real" means to be mind independent', thrown into the water by Kant, has led you into all sorts of unforeseen difficulties.

1. I do not rejected classical logic. But it is not a complete tool, much as Newtonian physics is an accurate but incomplete description. The world seen through the lens of language is simply not bivalent.
2. Rejecting bivalence is not antirealism., in fact quite the opposite. It is rejecting a distortion that prevents a faithful rendering of what is real.
3. That truth or falsity depends merely on the manner in which we speak of seems decidedly antirealist to me.
4. You quoted a discussion where I was defending the reality of the past and future. Its just that this reality, as most things, is not 0 or 1.

If you take reality to be mind independent then you commit to there being statements that are neither true nor false - like that the rock existed yesterday. Hence you drop classical logic in favour of some form of paraconsistent logic. While rejecting bivalence need not lead to antirealism, antirealism does lead to rejecting bivalence.

Seems to me you are not happy with the consequences of reality being mind independent. Might be time to reconsider it.

Seems to me you are not happy with the consequences of reality being mind independent. — Banno

What's wrong with reality being mind independent? Why do you think I am unhappy?

Mind independence is simply what "real" means. What is your problem with this definition?

Mind independence is simply what "real" means. — hypericin

It does? That's not what the dictionary says. At the least, some explanation is required. Wouldn't it be better to say that what is real is what is true?

SO, tell us about mind independence...

How's that work?

To approach the issue of what reality is/isn't on the basis of mind dependence/independence is, as you can see, a dead end. It seems impossible to tell which is true i.e. the truth is beyond our reach. We can argue though and we are doing exactly that. Personally, I'd propose a motion to change the definitions of real and unreal, to ones that we can actually use to decide questions on whether something is real or not.

Wouldn't it be better to say that what is real is what is true? — Banno

Absolutely not.

.

actually existing as a thing or occurring in fact; not imagined or supposed

This is just another way of saying, mind independent. Real/unreal is a conceptual divide which separates that which exists independently of our thoughts of it from that which is our thoughts of it.

True/false is a different divide, which categorizes statements, not existents.

actually existing as a thing or occurring in fact; not imagined or supposed

This is just another way of saying, mind independent. — hypericin

What twaddle.

As if facts were not, every one, true.

Not seeing any progress here. Seems as you decide to talk about things the wrong way, then reach the conclusion that rocks didn't exist. More fool you.

I see, sentences are real and rocks are true. This must be an extension of your private, idiosyncratic language where "to exist" means being the subject of a predicate. Why your personal language should be of interest to anyone else is beyond me.

Quine's account, rather than mine.

Mind independence is simply what "real" means. What is your problem with this definition? — hypericin

So my mind isn't real? My thoughts and feelings aren't real?

Also a toy gun isn't a real gun, but (for the sake of argument) toy guns are mind-independent.

"Real" doesn't just mean "mind-independent". Which is why I have often said that antirealism isn't unrealism. It's unfortunate that realism is called realism. It leads to the kind of equivocation that you appear to be making here.

All this to return to the answer to your question: It is true that the rock existed yesterday. — Banno

From my understanding @hypericin isn't asking if the rock existed yesterday. He's asking which theory of time is correct: growing block, presentism, or eternalism.

Perhaps; yet

To say "This rock exists" is saying something about the rock. Can this same something be said of the rock of yesterday or tomorrow? — hypericin

Now to say that the rock exists is not to say something about the rock. Existence is not a predicate in the way being granite is.

and to be "real" is not to be mind independent.

Now to say that the rock exists is not to say something about the rock. Existence is not a predicate in the way being granite is. — Banno

Maybe not in classical logic, but perhaps classical logic doesn't really fit with ordinary language, hence the development of free logic which makes for claims like "God does not exist" possible, and which some of us accept as true.

Or if you want to continue with classical logic then consider what I said here:

That fairies exist is that ∃xFx, where Fx means "x is a fairy". If ¬∃xFx then fairies do not exist. Some x is my nose but no x is a fairy, therefore my nose exists but fairies don't.

Now to say that the rock exists is not to say something about the rock. Existence is not a predicate in the way being granite is. — Banno

Only insofar as our favourite logic treats it with a special predicate (ish) called a quantifier.

∃x T(x) ∧ R(x)

But in other words,

An x exists such that x is this and x rocks.

Hmm, how about a rockifier?

Яx T(x) ∧ E(x)

An x rocks such that x is this and x exists.

Obviously this would be silly. But the utility of the canonical expression is in requiring an upfront commitment as to the perfectly sensible question whether or not such an x exists.

The distinction between "real" and "unreal" is the distinction between mind independence and mind dependence. — hypericin

Can you talk about anything at all, that isn’t dependent on the thought of it?

How can anything at all be mind independent, when mind is that which determines what independence is? How can anything be said to be mind independent if the mind has already thought of it?

Just to assert a distinction of anything presupposes a necessary relation which cannot be given from the assertion itself. Even to merely perceive a difference presupposes that which recognizes that there is one, whether entailment of what the difference is occurs or not.

The distinction between the real and the unreal is given merely from the principle of complementarity a priori, but the principle itself is mind dependent. Whatever is real is not unreal, and whatever is unreal is not real. The relation between real and unreal needs to be distinguished long before the relation of either one to its dependence on the mind. Oooooo.....the irony.
————-

“.....Transcendental idealism allows that the objects of external intuition—as intuited in space, and all changes in time—as represented by the internal sense, are real....”

.....which just suggests, whichever philosophy is used determines what mind independence means.

From my understand hypericin isn't asking if the rock existed yesterday. He's asking which theory of time is correct: growing block, presentism, or eternalism. — Michael

Yes, I regret the way I phrased it.

Also a toy gun isn't a real gun, but (for the sake of argument) toy guns are mind-independent. — Michael

"define real" produces two definitions:

"actually existing as a thing or occurring in fact; not imagined or supposed."
"(of a substance or thing) not imitation or artificial; genuine."

It is an unfortunate fact that multiple meanings will forever muddle all philosophical discussion. Let's restrict the conversation to the first usage.

So my mind isn't real? My thoughts and feelings aren't real? — Michael

Your thoughts and feelings themselves are real. But it is what they are about that is in question. When one says "X is real", this does not mean, "My thought that X is real". These are two different assertions.

Your thoughts and feelings themselves are real. — hypericin

My thoughts are real. My thoughts are not mind-independent. Therefore some things which are real are not mind-independent. Therefore “real” doesn’t mean “mind-independent”.

My thoughts are real. My thoughts are not mind-independent. Therefore some things which are real are not mind-independent. Therefore “real” doesn’t mean “mind-independent”. — Michael

Rather than "mind independent", how about "independent of thoughts about them"? When you say "my thoughts are real", you are thinking about your thoughts. You will have thoughts whether or not you think about having thoughts.

Even better, I like "Existence not contingent on having thoughts about them".

Now to say that the rock exists is not to say something about the rock. — Banno

Gibberish.

Tell Lord Russell. And Kant.

Tell Lord Russell. And Kant. — Banno

How would you or presumably they handle illusions? Suppose the rock is illusory. Illusions exist, yes yes, but the sentence is "the rock exists"