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Conference: The Metaphysics of Time: Themes from Prior

As part of a three year project, The Primacy of Tense: A.N. Prior Now and Then, funded by The Danish Council for Independent Research (FKK) the third conference called The Metaphysics of Time will be held at Aalborg University March 19–21, 2019. We invite submissions on A.N. Prior’s contribution to metaphysics, stretching from his early writings on theology to his later extensive work on the metaphysics of time. Philosophical papers, formal or informal, are welcome. This includes papers on the history of temporal logic.

Conference: The Metaphysics of Time: Themes from Prior

As part of a three year project, The Primacy of Tense: A.N. Prior Now and Then, funded by The Danish Council for Independent Research (FKK) the third conference called The Metaphysics of Time will be held at Aalborg University March 19–21, 2019. We invite submissions on A.N. Prior’s contribution to metaphysics, stretching from his early writings on theology to his later extensive work on the metaphysics of time. Philosophical papers, formal or informal, are welcome. This includes papers on the history of temporal logic.

The conference was held at Aalborg University on March 19–21, 2019

Relevant themes

Examples of relevant themes include (but are not restricted to):

  • The tensed view of time
  • The tenseless view of time
  • Branching time
  • Time and modality
  • Tense logic
  • Presentism and its rivals
  • The arrow of time
  • Time and eternity
  • Human freedom and divine foreknowledge
  • A.N. Prior’s early papers
  • Abstract entities and logical constructions
  • Hybrid logic
  • The logic of ethics
  • Anselm’s ontological argument

Keynote speaker Dr. William Lane Craig

The invited keynote speaker is Dr. William Lane Craig. Over the years he has contributed significantly to the development and exploration of the metaphysics of time. He is the author of a number of books and papers on the topic.

Some of Dr. William Lane Craig's important books on time:

- The Problem of Divine Foreknowledge and Future
- Contingents from Aristotle to Suarez. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1988.
- The Tensed Theory of Time: A Critical Examination. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2000.
- The Tenseless Theory of Time: A Critical Examination, Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2000.
- God, Time and Eternity. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2001.

Keynote speaker Dr. William Lane Craig

The invited keynote speaker is Dr. William Lane Craig. Over the years he has contributed significantly to the development and exploration of the metaphysics of time. He is the author of a number of books and papers on the topic.

Some of Dr. William Lane Craig's important books on time:

- The Problem of Divine Foreknowledge and Future
- Contingents from Aristotle to Suarez. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1988.
- The Tensed Theory of Time: A Critical Examination. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2000.
- The Tenseless Theory of Time: A Critical Examination, Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2000.
- God, Time and Eternity. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2001.

Abstracts

All abstracts as pdf

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Keynote lecture 1: Time, Tense, and Eternity

William Lane Craig

Abstract:
How does God relate to time? Theologians have differed over whether God should be thought to exist timelessly or omnitemporally throughout infinite time. A watershed question for the doctrine of divine eternity is whether one adopts a tensed or a tenseless theory of time. If a tenseless theory of time is true, then God's timeless existence is thus far forth unproblematic. But if a tensed theory of time is true, then God is most plausibly understood to exist temporally, in light of (i) His causal relation to the temporal world and (ii) His knowledge of tensed facts.

Keynote lecture 2: Legal Pardon, Tensed Time, and the Expiation of Guilt

William Lane Craig

Abstract:
Divine forgiveness is much more akin to a legal pardon by an executive authority than to the personal forgiveness characteristic of private relationships. For divine forgiveness, like a legal pardon, involves not merely the relinquishing of certain subjective feelings, but effecting an objective change in a person's legal status, making the pardonee no longer liable to punishment. But does a pardon expunge the guilt of the wrongdoer? In the Anglo-American justice system courts have differed on this question. An examination of legal opinions reveals that the answer hinges upon one's underlying theory of time. Courts which have ruled that a pardon blots out the guilt of the wrongdoer tacitly presuppose a tensed theory of time.

Programme and practical information

Conference Organization and contact

Conference Organization
Program committee: David Jakobsen, Per Hasle, Peter Øhrstrøm.

Conference manager: Fatima Sabir.

For more information contact:
Fatima Sabir, fsabir@ruc.dk or

David Jakobsen davker@hum.aau.dk.