A reader, Mark Garron (MA Candidate, York University), wrote in the other day for help finding an outside reader on his MA thesis on the philosophy of time. Because the Cocoon is here to help early-career philosophers, I offered to put out a call for interest on Mark's behalf. Here is his thesis abstract:
The objective of this thesis is a broad defense of the passage thesis presented by Ned Markosian. My claim is that for most intents and purposes the word flow and passage are interchangeable. There is some distinction to be made between the dimension or extension of time that is unlike spatial extension or dimension that it is fair to say that it passes or as I prefer to claim it flows. There are two very broad sorts of criticisms that are levelled at the passage thesis. They are motion and meaning.
The first criticism is there is something incoherent or contradictory about the flow of time. Simply put, time is used to measure motions and therefore to describe time itself as a motion seems wrong. If time is a motion as flow implies it needs to be measurable as a rate or at least understood as measurable by a rate. The second criticism proposes that there is nothing usefully descriptive about referring to time as passing or flowing. Everyone agrees that time is not in all respects like a flowing river. The second criticism contends that once we eliminate all the ways time does not flow like a river there remains nothing flow like about time. At best it is without any content and worst it is deceptive. They contend if we eliminate a description of time as passing or flowing we losing nothing testable and we lose no useful concepts. I will argue that the flow of time is neither incoherent nor barren of conceptual content.
If you have a background in philosophy of time and are interested in helping Mark out, please feel free to email him at mgarron@yorku.ca.
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