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Even though Augustine provides reasons to support his statements in Confessions, some of his reasons or statements are still subject to critic. From here on, I will state possible objections by the critics and defend with my own reasons to support Augustine and strengthen his arguments. First of all, Augustine’s statement that time seems to move toward the non-existence (past) gives opening for critics to object by reasoning that in all cases, time only flows from the past into the future; coffee and milk will mix spontaneously after pouring the milk in (future) but will never un-mix after pouring milk in (past). The critic’s reason seems to be reasonable only on the ground that the critic already knows that milk and coffee will mix. What about to the majority with no knowledge of it? In my opinion, to such people, time flows from the future into the non-existence past; they can predict at a certain moment (present) that milk and coffee will mix (future) by basing on their previous experience that X and Y does mix recently (present of future things), at the instant they pour the milk into coffee they will see that it mixes (present of present things), and in the end they knew that milk and coffee did mix (past) and next time, will remember at an instant like they remembered that X and Y did mix before (present of past things). Therefore, I believe “time exists … in the sense that it tends toward non-existence”.

Second, a critic can argue that time exists not at the present instant with no duration but instead that it does have measurable duration, can provide examples of how a person can tell how long it takes for an object to move from point A to B, who can run faster or how a watch can tell the duration, and can argue how all the measurements can be done not through the mind but experimentally, externally from the mind. The critic needs to keep in mind that these are two different “times” she is referring to. Augustine is referring to time from larger creation view point in the sense that in eternity, there is only present, but in this world there seems to be past, present and future, which conveys that the bodies are created with time and moving in time. However the critic is referring to the different notion of time or fractional instant of the creation timeline. Nonetheless, if we are to accept that past and future have no existence or that time doesn’t have real existence in them, at any instant present, there will be no duration; for instance when trying to measure how fast a person is running at the present, she will see that it is immeasurable. And if we are to judge who runs faster, in order for us to remember the “time” taken for both runners, we may have to simultaneously recall form memory of their times and in this case, present is working with the past through memory, using the distention of the soul, the mind. In these cases, either the critic’s counter arguments are irrelevant to Augustine’s main concept of time or the arguments which are meant to contradict his concepts are instead being supportive.

I would provide a model based on God’s omniscience to support Augustine in that his notion of timeless God is consistent with the Bible and that instead of contradicting God’s omniscience, it is even strengthening the Biblical statements of Him. According to the confessions and how Augustine comes about to study the nature of time in detail in his Confessions, there are critics who counter argue him by asking that if there is no time before the creation by God, what He’s doing before all these creations. It appears to me that they are arguing that before creation, God has no will to do so and that there has to be a moment when He decides to initialize the creation. In order to do so, there has to be a new will being created and entering God and if He is truly eternal, this new will cannot enter Him or His old will to do nothing (no creation) cannot be changed. This is as if questioning the eternality of God.

Furthermore, in my opinion, the critics seem to also doubt the omniscient nature of God because they are stating that nothing could exist before creation and that only if something gets created, it may enter into God and change Him. Let’s look at such statement from the perspective of knowledge. If we were to reason like the critics, before the creation, there was nothing, not even knowledge, and if there was no knowledge, God did not possess knowledge before its creation and thus He does not know everything or possess omniscience as told in the Bible. If knowledge was later created, then for God to be considered omniscient, He has to be willing to change from “know nothing” to “know all”. These statements are contradicting both God’s eternality and omniscience. However, Augustine’s notion of timeless God helps solve this contradictory problem; “in eternity nothing moves into the past: all is present”. God exists outside of the time so there is only present (no past or future) in eternity and the present consists of the ability to perceive all at once and that everything He knows already exists, which is consistent with God’s omniscience nature. Since the creation of time and the bodies are also a timeless act, through God, all creations happen in an instant without any moments to be labeled as past or future upon God’s creation. The critics may counter argue by using creationism chapter of Genesis by saying that above statement cannot be right because God did not just create all in an instant but took six days of creations and by saying that my reasons to support Augustine have fallacy.

Their counter argument can be replied in two ways. First I could object their counter argument and restate Augustine where he said that Biblical passages should not be taken literally but instead only spiritually, which means that the critics are interpreting the Bible with the wrong reason. On the other hand, I could instead agree with their statement about the creation in six days while also restating Augustine’s statement on Biblical interpretation. For a timeless God of eternity, everything exist at present and in this case everything is still created at an instant even though it may seem days according to the uncertain accounts of “someone” but no one can know for sure the duration of the creation because as said before, the creation is a timeless act and Biblical duration cannot be taken literally. That is why I state that Augustine’s notion and understanding of the nature of time and eternity is no where in contradiction but even supports the Biblical nature of God.

In Summary, Augustine argues that there is no time before creation and that eternity consists only of the present. He also states that God of eternity exist outside of time and that all creations are made in an instant by a timeless act. He provides reasons to support that even though time has no real existence, it can have its existence through the presence and incorporation of memories and predictions and that one reason people can measure time is due to distention of the soul; through the memory, introduced by the mind, which is also the soul. Although Augustine’s arguments are subject to critics, they are not weakened by the critics’ objections because either the critics’ views are weak, irrelevant or are supporting Augustine in a sense. Furthermore, Augustine’s notion of nature of time is consistent with Biblical aspect of God, His actions and events in nature.

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Literatures Cited
Saint Augustine. Confessions.1961. Penguin Group, Book XI.

Copyrighted By:  Kaung Ko | KMKBlog.com

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Even though the three types of times do not have a real existence, people still talk about and measure time. Since a person cannot measure something that does not exist, in order for him to be measuring time, it must exist for him in a sense. Augustine concluded that the existence of time in the humans can be achieved through existing in the present and by experiencing memories (past) and predictions (future) (Book XI: 20). Instead of stating there are three times in past, present, and future perspectives which are proven to have no real existence, Augustine now reasons that time can be in some sort of existence as such: “a present of past things, a present of present things, and a present of future things”. This is what he means; if a person remembers how things those were in the past were like when they were at the present, it is through his memories at the present time, and if a person predicts how things will exist in the future, it is through the notion of present happenings and making extrapolation at this present time. Augustine now holds the idea that time can be measured only when it is in the passing processes through the present moment since it cannot be measured before passing, for they will be nothing and cannot be measured after it has passed, for there will no longer be anything existing to be measured. However, Augustine does not know how we can actually measure this instant of the present although it appears to be measurable to people because the present, as stated previously, does not have actual duration or extension. He disagrees with other philosophers or astrologers’ way of measuring time through the movement of the heavenly bodies because he believes that bodies are just moving in time and not time itself (Book XI: 24); even if the sun did stop as told in the bible, the hours that make up one day will still pass and therefore, time cannot be measured through movement of bodies.

The idea Augustine holds, in addition to the statement that time has existence only in a sense of present instant with no duration, is that time is a extension of the soul into the temporal world (Book XI: 26). Augustine knows that this would mean the soul is falling away from what is previously believed to be close to the goodness as in God, but this is the only possible way so far to measure time. When people measure time, they measure as if time is the property of the soul in that people are measuring things in their own memories at the present moment; since the past does not actually exist and the only way to measure time then is to measure it while it is passing at the “present of past things” state, people consider things from the past as though happening in the present only through memories. Since memories cannot be perceived by bodily aspects but only through the mind or the soul, time is an extension of the soul in a sense for Augustine.

In summary, Augustine states that time, past, present, and future do not have real existence because the present instant has no duration, that the reason why people still speak of time as measurable is when it is in passing process to reach to the non-existing past through the present, that time, as widely used by most, can only exist in the present through memories and predictions, and that time is in some way an extension of the soul.

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Literatures Cited
Saint Augustine. Confessions.1961. Penguin Group, Book XI.

Copyrighted By:  Kaung Ko | KMKBlog.com

In Book XI of “Confessions”, Augustine questions the nature of time and expresses the possibilities of its nature by providing examples regarding the three types of time, past, present and future. This paper will present that Augustine’s conclusion on the nature of time not only succeeds but is consistent with both the occurrence in nature and the Biblical aspect of God. In the first paragraph, the reasons behind Augustine’s inquiry of nature of time will be explained along with the reasons behind his statement of timeless God. Second paragraph will convey why time does not have real existence in the sense of past, present, and future aspects while the third paragraph will explain that time can have existence by existing in the present and by experiencing memories (past) and predictions (future). Third paragraph will explain why extension of the soul accounts for ability to measure time, followed by the fourth paragraph, summarizing Augustine’s arguments. Beginning from the fifth paragraph, I will critically engage Augustine’s argument by providing possible objections by the critics and defending Augustine by providing my own examples and reasons. From the seventh paragraph and beyond, I will conclude by providing a model to further support Augustine’s statements and show how they are consistent with most views. Summary will be presented in the last paragraph.

According to Augustine, God creates the heavenly and earthly bodies with time t and not in time, that there cannot be time before that time t. Since there is no time before time t, Augustine argues in defense against the critics that one cannot ask what God was doing “then” “before” all the creations because then and before both refer to having a time before the creation (Book XI: 10,11). Augustine also advises to take creationism in Genesis spiritually instead of taking it literally in a sense that God did not create things like a craftsman would have because there are no being or intermediate ingredients or substances to be used in creation of the universe and the world (Book XI: 5). From this and since God of Eternity is the Beginning and the End in Himself where there is none before and after, Augustine concludes that creation of time by a timeless God should then be a timeless act. However, Augustine does not understand why God creates the world, which is still in time and is changing in time and why he or others think they know what time is but fail to answer its nature. These lead to his inquiry of the nature of time itself.

First Augustine argues that time does not have real existence in his discussion regarding the three types of time; past, present, and future (Book XI: 15). He noted that time depends on the becoming (future), being (present) and passing away (past). Here, Augustine is already expressing his notion of time that time tends to move toward non-existence by arriving from the future, remaining for a moment and passing through the present, and going away into the past. He initially focuses on the real existence of time in past and future. He believes that since nothing that does not yet or no longer exists can be described as long or short time in a present tense, the correct way to describe the past and future in the sense of long time ago or ahead and short time ago and ahead is not to use present term but the past and futuristic terms “was” and “will be” (Eg. It was a long time ago). However, even then he states that it would be foolish to say that the past was long or short because once anything enters the state of the past, it becomes a non-being and non-existence, and if it no longer exists, then it no longer is what it was; in this case, no longer a long or short time. Similarly, it would not be right to state that the future will be a long or a short time because the future is not yet here and is still a non-existence, so there is no way of considering what anything that has yet to arrive really is. He concludes from these that past and future times do not really exist. Later, Augustine focuses on the real existence of time in present. He divides the present into present century, year, month, day, etc and finds out that even present time is hard to observe. He gets to this statement after expressing his examples: in the present century, only the present year is present in existence and the other years are either in the past or the future; in that present year, only the present month is in existence, only the present day exists in that present month, only the present hour exists in that present day, and so on. The only moment when it is possible to observe and call it present is at an instant, but since that instant cannot be broken down into smaller periods, it does not have a duration or length and thus it cannot really be called time. From this Augustine concludes that present time also does not have real existence.

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Literatures Cited
Saint Augustine. Confessions.1961. Penguin Group, Book XI.

Copyrighted By:  Kaung Ko | KMKBlog.com

What is the Noble Lie?

In Republic I, Socrates stated that sometimes it is better to put in some lies for the good of the city or the sake of the well being and healthiness of the city. This in here, in order to make sure the citizens of the exemplified, erected Republic city will accept their duties, obey, and keep following the right path, Socrates said the “Noble Lie”. The Noble Lie was taken from the Phoenicians and it goes like this: People are made under earth, once ready to go to the world, they all come up to Earth. Gold, Silver, Bronze or Iron are embedded within each soul with specified position. If a person has Gold or Silver in the soul, he is bound to be a ruler or auxiliary/warrior, and if other metal, to be of producing class. The offspring can have any metal in the soul, so there exist equal chances in the just city.

By: Kaung

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Pointing back to previous statements with the wax analogy, only intellect is capable of perceiving in clear and distinct manners, and thus the certainty of the thinking being to exist as long as the person is thinking comes from pure understanding through intellect; the mind and intellect are similar in nature to each other but different in nature and only act as unity in composition with the body (there is body and mind in a being operating separately) (AT VII 423). Additionally, since, as stated before, the knowing of the intellect’s or the mind’s capability to judge and understand is certain, it confirms that the nature of the mind, capable of thinking is better known than the bodies (wax).

By reasoning why the senses and imaginations are not capable of perceiving what is, and by stating how intellect alone is capable for all clear and distinct perceptions, the meditator concludes not only that the nature of the mind is better known than the bodies, but also concludes that she can know with certainty her existence and that she is a thinking thing.

Reference:
Descartes, R. Meditations on First Philosophy. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994. Vol. VII. p.16-23.

By: Kaung

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As with clarification regarding the senses, one may additionally argue that after the changeability, flexibility and extension of the wax are stripped from the characters of the wax, it is still the imagination judging what the naked wax really is or the nature of it (AT VII 272). However if one looks into this deeply, one will see that imagination brings “confused perceptions” because there is so much to imagine about what the wax really is but with intellect, “reflective and distinct perceptions” are obtained because only intellect and it’s involvement in thinking, judging and understanding the nature from the observed accidents are left out with certainty (AT VII 359).

If not by the senses and the imaginations, the meditator concludes that only the intellect can know the wax. Dependence on the senses and imaginations can only give uncertain imperfect perception of the wax, but when intellect alone is applied, certain and distinct perception can be experienced.  For instance, people will say they see the car, the wax, or the bodies but such perceptions can be doubtful because they can argue the validity of the existence of those bodies. However, the intellect is the one responsible for judging that what perceived through the senses and imaginations are really what they are and have been; intellect understands purely the previous roughly understood, known visible bodies.

Similarly and furthermore, as people discover more external bodies, through intellect they can lead themselves out of confused stages and to clear and distinct stages instead. Regardless of how many external bodies are out there, the intellect can and will understand. As people discover more, the intellect helps understand greater bodies. Thus the meditator may not know what other sensible attributes of the bodies (wax) are out there, but can know for certain the intellect will be able to understand.

And as long as things are perceived through the senses and imagination (though with doubts) and through intellect (with clear understanding), they confirm that the meditator is a thinking being.  Other bodily movements and external actions cannot confirm the existence because they can be deceived such as in walking; “walk” part in “I walk, I exist” is doubtful (AT VII 352). However the thinking part in “I think, I exist” isn’t doubtful for doubting is also thinking. This leads to state that since the meditator is a thinking being and is thinking or thinks, the meditator exists (the “I” exist”), and that this thinking is separable from the bodily attributes.

By: Kaung

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To clarify her conclusion, the meditator reasons that senses are not responsible for knowing and she gives the wax experience to prove it. The wax is first observed in all five qualities: taste, smell, touch, sound, and sight, and also by the shape and the size. The meditator observes that the fresh hard wax, which gives a cracking sound when hit with knuckles, has honey taste and scent.  However, as it is heated, she sees that hard wax liquefies giving a puddle with no sounds when hit, and is lost of its taste and scent (AT VII 30). From there she concludes that senses could not be responsible to let her still know that it is the same wax because she has just seen, right in front of her, the changeability and flexibility of the wax through the senses.

One may argue at this point that even though senses can change, they are still the main sources to provide necessary basic information about the bodies (wax in this case). This argument is understandable but not acceptable because apart from possibility of being deceived by an evil deceiver, even though senses perceive information of the bodies, they can only gather general partial information. For instance, senses can only show that wax changes in shape, color, smell but can’t judge that the wax before and after are the same. In the following passages, one will see that imagination is not capable of making this distinction either.

After showing the incapability of knowing by means of senses, the meditator moves to see if it is due to imagination. From the observation of the flexibility, the meditator asserts that the body (of the wax) had extended; the shape of wax transformed from being solid to liquid, and if it were to be heated longer, it could become larger space taking thing. Since the bodies are shapes that take space, and wax is an extendable body, the meditator categorizes wax as a space taking, transformable thing. However, even though it can be transformed into many shapes, the meditator is not able to imagine all the possible shapes because of the infinite amounts; the wax or its shapes can be imagined as triangular, flat, round, pyramidal, and many others or in between. Thus imagination could not have grasped the fact that it is the same wax, or in the case of searching for what “I” is, imagination would not be good enough to see all the possibilities of what it is in pure form.

By: Kaung

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