Course Description
On the one hand, time is completely familiar. On the other, it is a total mystery. As you might expect, the combination makes for good philosophy. In this course, we will study a variety of philosophical puzzles concerning the nature of time. Is time an illusion? Does time pass? Is the present special? Is time travel possible? Do the past and future exist? Does time have a direction? What is spacetime? What are the special and general theories of relativity? What do they imply about the nature of time?
Professor
James Binkoski
Paper 1
This was my first paper at college. Already, you can see that I’ve deviated from the standard five-paragraph essay format with this 11 paragraph piece. But, my style is still comparative to the way it was in high school, and I was still writing for a grade. I wrote this essay in one sitting, resulting in one first and final draft. I learned through writing this paper that I needed to allot more time and effort into writing at the college level. Nonetheless, this is still a paper that I put a lot of work into and am proud of. Click the title below to view the full paper!
The Argument from Special Relativity Against Presentism: The Failure of Markosian’s Reply
Paper 2
I learned my lesson on paper one and approached paper two with more vigor and time. This paper analyzes the reality of time travel through disproving a counterargument. In this paper, I learned how important it was to hone in on every word of a quote or piece of writing because every word, even the word ‘can,’ can change the entire meaning and/ or validity of the piece. Click the title below to read the full paper!
David Lewis’s Contextual Solution to the Grandfather Paradox
Final Paper
While there was a prompt about the feasibility of time travel, I submitted a proposal to write this paper about my own topic. As my title implies, I wrote about the common-sense view of time and how it ‘passes.’ In my paper, I explain this view, why it intuitively seems right, and why it’s inevitably wrong due to the physics supporting Einstein’s Theory of Special Relativity. The inspiration for this topic came from my initial desire to take the class. In high school, I wrote my valedictory address about time passing in our brains and how each moment that passes seems more insignificant/ short compared to the previous one. The research that went into that speech fascinated me and inspired me to take this course; however, throughout the course, I developed an opposing view to the one I had perpetuated in my speech. This final paper serves as an indirect refutation of my own work in my valedictory address (linked in the pre-college tab of this website). Click the title below to read the full paper!
An Explanation and Refutation of the Common-Sense View of Time: Presentism