Talk:Problem of future contingents

message: Does Aristotle deny bivalence, or is he denying excluded middle, or both?  These options should be carefully separated.Pruss (talk) 14:46, 17 August 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Interpretive issue 

message: Imagine the following universe:
:"Moment X"=TRUE; "There's light"=FALSE; "The fact is empirically true"=TRUE
:"Moment X"=FALSE; "There's light"=TRUE; "The fact is empirically true"=TRUE
: Any other combination between "Moment X" and "There's light"...; "The fact is empirically true"=FALSE
Considering this universe, what sense makes the expression ("There's light" AND NOT("There's light"))?
(Also posted at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Contradiction#A_Question) --Faustnh (talk) 22:13, 20 March 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  A Question 

message: From :
-- Tijfo098 (talk) 22:00, 10 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Aristotle vs Diodorus 

message: There is actually more than one problem called this way (albeit they are related) . This article needs a lot of work. Tijfo098 (talk) 22:44, 10 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  More than one problem 

message: This doesn't seem to take into account branching time models of quantum mechanics, such as Hugh Everett's Many world interpretation.</br>
Also, the following sentence seems ambiguous: “Suppose that a sea-battle will not be fought tomorrow. Then it was also true yesterday (and the week before, and last year) that it will not be fought, since any true statement about what will be the case was also true in the past.”</br>
By "not fought tomorrow" does this mean on a specific day X? If so there is no paradox, as this merely relates to that specific day. I presume "not fought tomorrow" is instead taken to be a true statement on all days, past and future. If it is intended in this latter sense, then mathematical induction would indeed seem to imply that the battle is never fought, if the original assertion is true, classical bivalent logic is used (thus validating the law of excluded middle and the law of non-contradiction), and a classical linear (i.e. determinate and non-branching) timeline is assumed.</br>
Looking at the article as a whole, if a branching model of time is assumed, then there seems (to me) to be no paradox. Along some branching timelines the battle might be fought, and along others it might not be fought. The proposition as to whether the battle is fought or not in the future can then be considered to be true and false depending on the chosen timeline. When looking at the overall time tree, as long as the battle is fought at some point, along some timeline branch section, the statement "the battle was fought" is then true.</br>
Even then though, there is the question of how you define "the battle" (a given sequence or state space of quantum states?) opposed to a different version of the battle or a different battle altogether. The term "happened" also has issues regarding definition. Definitions are a problem even if a linear (i.e. non-branching) model of time is assumed.
Annoyamouse (talk) 06:27, 9 November 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: It's meant to refer to an unequivocal fact that obtains at some particular time. See philosophy of time, but I'd imagine there are bigger fish to fry than future contingents in regard to branching time models; an implicit presentism for one (er… many).—Machine Elf 1735 19:55, 9 November 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi Machine Elf 1735! I'm a newbie Wikipedian and math/physics undergrad, with a slight interest, but no training, in philosophy. I really appreciate the clarification, etc. Thanks. :-) Annoyamouse (talk) 04:07, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Branching time models